2008 Bugatti Veyron on 2040-cars

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Man rolls $400,000 vintage Bugatti in race, goes for a pint

One of the risks associated with vintage car racing is damaging a rare, priceless piece of automotive history, but we're pretty sure that one recent participant is just happy to be alive. Edmund Burgess, of Lavenham, UK, was participating in the Prescott Speed Hill Climb in Gloucestershire, UK when, according to Car Buzz, the brakes reportedly failed on his 1924 Bugatti Type 13 causing it to go off course and roll over.
With an open cockpit on the car, all that was protecting Burgess were a helmet, goggles and a jacket, and while the video shows that his head came very close to making contact with the wall and ground, and that he was briefly trapped under the car, he fortunately didn't suffer any serious injuries.
Too bad the same can't be said for the Bugatti. The vintage racer, worth an estimated 250,000 British pounds (about $390,000 US), was heavily damaged, but the report says that Burgess is determined to get it fixed and racing again in just eight weeks. So what does a racer do after crashing his rare sports car and live to race another day? Probably the same thing we'd all do. Grab a beer. The video of the crash is posted below.

Out with the clay, in with the VR: Bugatti's design studio is all digital

Bugatti recently unveiled three limited-edition, multi-million-dollar Chiron derivatives in less than a year, a Herculean task for such a small company. Achim Anscheidt, the head of the firm's design department, told Autoblog maintaining this pace wouldn't have been possible without the use of virtual reality technology. "We have the feeling we don't need clay anymore. With VR, we can do everything on the spot. We can sit next to each other and talk about the car, we can change the wheels, change the color, and sometimes make modifications on the spot," he explained. In comparison, using clay has several disadvantages. It's more difficult to tell how sunlight reflects off the body, for example. It's also more expensive and far more time consuming. "It's only through [VR] that we had the chance to develop the Divo, the La Voiture Noire and the Centodieci in such a rapid amount of time," he affirmed. The team in charge of designing the EB110-inspired Centodieci notably began the project about six months before the car made its public debut at the 2019 edition of the ritzy, champagne-soaked Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance held on California's picturesque Pacific coast. While VR isn't new, the technology wasn't advanced enough to replace clay in a styling studio until about 2016. Anscheidt hasn't looked back; going all-digital reduced the amount of time it takes to design a car by about 40%. This isn't a case of robots replacing humans, either. Bugatti still needs talented designers, and the number of people it assigns to each project hasn't drastically changed, but they now work differently than in the past. View 40 Photos And, the widespread use of VR in Bugatti's design department doesn't mean its cars are no longer drawn by hand. Anscheidt explained every project still starts with a series of sketches that allow designers to explore different directions and identify the one they want to take the car-to-be in. Here again, digitalization plays a substantial role. Early sketches are sometimes done on a tablet rather than on a piece of paper. "Of course, when [deputy design director] Frank Heyl and I go to lunch, we still sketch on napkins," he said with a smile. Knowing how to use 3D-modeling and VR is only one of the skills Anscheidt looks for when hiring new designers.

Bugatti's final Divo is a tribute to its last official Le Mans entry

Bugatti's last official Le Mans entry served as a source of inspiration for its final Divo. The last unit in a sold-out 40-car run left the French firm's headquarters wearing a blue livery that echoes the track-bound variant of the EB110. Unveiled at the 2018 edition of the Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance, and priced at around ˆ5 million (nearly $6 million) before customization options, the Divo stands proud as the first coachbuilt Bugatti released during the 21st century. It's much more than merely a rebodied Chiron; it's its own thing, and the two cars are technically different. "As well as unique design, customers who buy a coachbuilt model enjoy a new, individual driving experience. Each small series undergoes the same degree of development as would a larger production run," explained Pierre Rommelanger, the head of overall vehicle development at Bugatti, in a statement. The final Divo's anonymous owner wanted to channel the spirit of the EB110 that competed in the 24 Hours of Le Mans in 1994. Most of the exterior is painted in light blue, just like the race car, and the wheels are finished in gold. Parts of the lower body wear a darker shade of blue chosen to forge a link to the modern era, according to Bugatti. Blue also dominates the interior. French Racing Blue and Deep Blue were used to wrap parts like the seats and the dashboard, though it's interesting to note that the design isn't symmetrical. The driver's seat is lighter than the passenger's seat. Elsewhere in the cabin, matte gray carbon-colored trim pieces provide a touch of contrast. Spotting the final Divo won't require a well-trained eye. Bugatti notes none of the 40 examples built were identical. Customers worked directly with the brand to customize the paint, the leather upholstery, the stitching, and the trim. What doesn't vary from car to car is the engine: it's an 8.0-liter W16 quad-turbocharged to 1,500 horsepower. Selling cars is relatively easy; building them and delivering them on-time is harder. Bugatti ticked all three boxes, and the Divo project is finished. The one-of-a-kind La Voiture Noire (which reportedly cost $13 million) has been completed as well, so the French company is now working on bringing the EB110-inspired Centodieci to production. Related video: