Tuesday 26th August 2014

Bugatti Veyron (price) crash

How do you score a Veyron for £167K? Well, you might have to do some panel beating

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Crashing a Bugatti Veyron is always going to be expensive. And with the online auction of a moderately crumpled version having finished yesterday in Switzerland, we now know just how expensive. Bidding finished at just CHF 253,900, or £167,285 at current exchange rates.

The blue-and-black Veyron was involved in a crash in Austria back in April, with GT Spirit reporting it left a wet Autobahn at a reasonable lick and ended up at the bottom of a grass bank. No other cars were apparently involved and the driver was unharmed - although the same probably can't be said for his no-claims discount.

Non bent one in PH classifieds may be a safer bet

It's a 2008 car with 31,924 km showing - a pretty stratospheric mileage by Veyron standards - but it's still barely a quarter of the retail price of an undamaged version. The cheapest Veyron in the PH Classifieds is currently £675,000. And as the damage doesn't look too severe, certainly for anyone used to browsing salvage classifieds, the highest bidder has surely landed a bit of a bargain...

Quite possibly not. For a start, a combination of our shaky German and Google Translate suggests that the auction isn't final yet - it seems to have been held to establish the car's residual value so the insurance company can decide whether to repair it or sell it. And even if the winning bidder does get the car, getting parts for something like a Veyron is a far from straightforward process. You're unlikely to be able to turn up at the factory with a list of part numbers.

The auction listing (with extensive pics) says damage is to 'front, rear, left sill, front sill, left door, right door' and - more ominously - 'car floors', and the pictures show that suspension links have been both bent and broken, although there's no suggestion the engine and transmission have been damaged. Repair costs are estimated at between CHF 730,000 and CHF 855,000 - that's £480,000 to £563,000 - meaning the unlucky Veyron's fate may well be to be broken for bits. Anyone need a quad-turbocharged W16 engine?

[Sources: GT Spirit's original crash story and later update; AXA Winterhur)

 

[Agent Orange]

Worst "We've got a classifieds section" post ever...

[Agent Orange]

Dale487 said:

Is this the most expensive piece automotive salvage ever?

Close but not quite

The Bugatti from the Lake - 1925 Bugatti Type 22 Brescia
http://www.hemmings.com/hsx/stories/2011/02/01/hmn...

[Agent Orange]

iloveboost said:

I was a billionaire:
Buy this for £150000-£175000. Pay a good company known for this kind of craziness loads of money to stick powertrain/interior parts into a relatively cheap/decent road legal mid engined chassis available with a broken/optional powertrain. Then you've got a unique hypercar with a reliable 1000+hp in an 1100-1200kg car for £200,000-£225,000.
I'm 99% sure somebody will just repair it though.

I think I'd just convert the engine into a table for my man cave.