Wednesday 6th March 2013

Geneva Motor Show 2013: supercars & tuners

The weird, the wonderful and the extreme from the Geneva show floor

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Of all the annual shows Geneva is one of the better ones for a glimpse on life on the wild side of the motor industry, with plenty of out-there madness from the tuners, niche brands and dreamers. All of which makes for a pleasant diversion from the hard-nosed business over on the mainstream corporate stands.

Where to start?

And if ever you needed evidence that money doesn’t buy you taste a quick glimpse of some of the tuner cars will back that assertion right up. Metallic pink Range Rovers with side scoops and bonnet vents? If your money’s good it’s yours.

Regular perps on the rap sheet of crimes against good taste include Mansory, its ‘Stallone’ Ferrari F12 almost beyond parody were it not for the red’n’carbon Bentley beside it. Mansory’s entry into the ‘most tasteless G-Wagen’ contest is a pretty strong effort too, the bright yellow Speranza likened to one wag to a juiced up Suzuki Jiminy. Hamann’s double DRL’d black’n’gold G is pretty obscene too but nothing compared with the aforementioned pink Range Rover.

AMG G not pokey enough? This should do...

Credit to Brabus though. Its V12 800 Widestar G-Wagen is, by some margin, the winner in this most niche of sub niches, the engorged G saving its true outrageousness for the mechanical spec which liberates the ‘power reserves inherent in the 6.0-litre V12 Biturbo engine’ to unleash, yes, 800hp and 1,047lb ft of torque. To keep things vaguely within the bounds of reason Brabus limits the latter to 811lb ft but it’s still enough to see the G to 62mph in 4.5 seconds. Without the 155mph limiter Brabus says it would do 168mph, which sounds utterly terrifying. Also on the Brabus stand is a rather more tasteful and menacingly black CLS Shooting Brake. With 730hp.

At the more tasteful end of the tuning spectrum Ruf’s 991-based RT35 S is a very slick piece of kit, 650hp from its twin-turbo engine and the trademark integrated roll cage now 20hp up on before and available with a dual-clutch transmission. The 997 911 Turbo-based RT12 R still beats it with 750hp and looks gorgeous while an exploded view of the mad V8-powered RGT-8 is just fascinating.

Exploded stuff - always fascinating

Upstairs you get a slightly different flavour, thanks to the prevalence of design studies from studios like Pininfarina, Carrozzeri Touring and Italdesign. The former’s Sergio concept (named after the great man himself) is trumped in the beauty stakes only by the 1965 Dino Berlinetta Speciale concept beside it while the Touring Disco Volante oozes class and style. Whether you’d chop up an 8C to have one is another matter though.

The nearby Spyker B6 Venator concept is interesting too, this 375hp-plus transverse V6-engined study previewing a new production model due next year and aiming for a relatively affordable pricetag of around £100,000 or so.

Touring Disco Volante	Brabus CLS
Hamann G-Class	Spyker B6 Venator
Mansory F12 & G-Wagen	Techart Panamera

[Davey S2]

The rest of them should be burnt

[FisiP1]

Spyker still exists?

[TomTVR500]

Davey S2 said:

The rest of them should be burnt

Agree! That Porsche looks stunning.

Also the lights on that Alfa a quite obviously just picked out of Ferraris parts bin. Spare pair of 599 headlights..... yeah they'll do the trick!

[loudlashadjuster]

Wot no Sbarro?

[anything fast]

That Panamera! Wow.. just wow! never thought I would say that about one of those..

[Oddball RS]

911's and the CLS look ok the rest are a joke!

[oilit]

FisiP1 said:

Spyker still exists?

my thoughts entirely - i thought it was swapped for some debt raising for saab or something like that !

[Alfa159Ti]

It pains me to say it, but that Disco Volante looks awful.

[oilit]

Alfa159Ti said:

It pains me to say it, but that Disco Volante looks awful.

yes i agree - but the spyker - (see their website for more pictures) - looks rather nice

[bobberz]

oilit said:

FisiP1 said:

Spyker still exists?

my thoughts entirely - i thought it was swapped for some debt raising for saab or something like that !

+2! I was surprised by this! Looks fantastic (as have all of Spyker's modern cars, barring the Peking-Paris SUV concept). Is it based on the Evora? The lines are similar, as is the powerplant.

Where's pics of the Pinninfarina concepts and Ruf's 991? The 997 is old news (though very, very lovely! )

[bobberz]

That G-wagen!

[Amirhussain]

911, CLS & Spyker for me please, scrap the rest.

[redroadster]

We have our own cottage industry add on merchants of bad taste such as kahn from bradford they promote themselves as people who style cars i call it ruin cars, with a choice of bad contrasting colour schemes both inside and out they really believe they are improving the standard cars lol.

[lewisf182]

the Techart and Mansory efforts are laughable. But sadly their intended audience (i.e. Gulzar) will lap them up... you know what they say about fools and there money

[bobberz]

Apparently, the Spyker is based on the Artega GT.

[TomTVR500]

redroadster said:

We have our own cottage industry add on merchants of bad taste such as kahn from bradford they promote themselves as people who style cars i call it ruin cars, with a choice of bad contrasting colour schemes both inside and out they really believe they are improving the standard cars lol.

I agree entirely! Clue is in the name.

They really believe they are improvng the standard car because its Bradford........ say no more.

[mikEsprit]

No separate article for Spyker!?!

We're all interested in melted McLarens, cartoonish Lambos, and misnomered F-cars, but surely Spyker deserves better than this from pistonheads?

[Bucketeer]

For a moment there I thought I read "800bhp G-Wagen".

[Killer2005]

That Brabus

[anonymous-user]

bobberz said:

Apparently, the Spyker is based on the Artega GT.

This could prove interedting