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Hearse based on Rolls-Royce Ghost called the Ghoster, may be too on-the-nose

If you want to roll in a Rolls-Royce even after the very end, an Italian company called Biemme Special Cars has turned the Ghost into one of the world's most luxurious hearses. It keeps the sedan's distinctive rear-hinged doors and luxurious cabin and adds a huge coffin compartment. While it's relatively difficult to make an elegant-looking hearse, the Ghost-based model — which is oddly known as the Ghoster — features a pretty sleek design. It's almost identical to the regular-production Ghost from the tip of the front bumper to the upper part of the windshield. Beyond that, it features an upward-sloping roof panel painted in the same color as the hood, huge side windows with a bright frame, and a seriously long wheelbase. Biemme explains that it expanded the Ghost's body using a tubular structure that's covered with steel panels. The passenger compartment looks like it's standard Ghost fare, so what you get largely depends on the boxes you tick when you configure the car. Wood interior trim, leather upholstery, and other opulences comes standard, and Biemme notes that a 1,300-watt sound system is available ... because you need that in a hearse? Maybe to play something by Ray Parker Jr.? The list of options also includes a built-in drink cooler, the Starlight headliner, internet connectivity, and LED interior lighting, while the rear doors can be ordered with curtains. Biemme separated the passenger and coffin compartments with a shatter-proof divider. It then added a power-operated platform and LED lighting, while the same type of wood trim and leather upholstery used in the passenger compartment adds a finishing touch to the design. There are no hearse-specific mechanical modifications. Power comes from a 6.7-liter V12 that's twin-turbocharged to 563 horsepower and 627 pound-feet of torque, so the Ghoster should offer decent acceleration in spite of what we imagine is a not-inconsequential amount of weight added by the hearse conversion.  Biemme hasn't announced pricing for the Ghoster. For context, the standard Rolls-Royce Ghost starts at approximately $350,000. Featured Gallery Rolls-Royce Ghost-based Ghoster hearse Aftermarket Rolls-Royce Wagon Luxury

Rolls-Royce Spectre EV spied up close in best spy shots yet

Rolls-Royce promised it would be developing the Spectre electric car “in plain sight,” and hereÂ’s some decent proof of that in spy shot form. Outside of the initial teaser photos released by Rolls-Royce earlier this year, we havenÂ’t seen any other details of the electric Rolls. ThatÂ’s changed today, as one of our spy shooters captured a test Spectre both on the pavement and on a flatbed.  The most intriguing angle of view is directly from the front. We can just make out that this Rolls appears to be wearing a version of the upcoming stacked headlight look previously spied on soon-to-come BMW models like the next-gen 7 Series and refreshed X7. The close-up view also provides a look at the traditional Rolls-Royce grille and the lower front bumper design. Perhaps Rolls will sort out a more elegant solution by production time, but the sensor module in the center of the lower front bumper is a bit of an eyesore.  Heading to the rear, we see some taillights lit up, but itÂ’s difficult to make out what they might look like in final production form. These could simply be test lights and not represent what the actual production lights look like, too. As for the rest of the rear, the lower bumper is quite the piece. It juts out way beyond the bodywork and in no way looks like the finished product. One of the last intriguing items of note is the angle of the rear tire when the driver has the steering wheel at full lock. ItÂ’s not an extreme angle of rear-wheel steer, but the rear wheel does appear to be turned in the opposite direction as the fronts. This car being a coupe, itÂ’s reasonable that it wouldnÂ’t need a massive amount of rear-wheel steering to be agile in a city, but itÂ’s still a Rolls-Royce, so coupe or not, itÂ’s massive. Beyond those specific details, we can simply enjoy seeing the upcoming EV in clearer, closer photos than ever before. Rolls-Royce says the production car is coming in 2023, so we suspect there will be many more spy shots and small details released between now and then. Related video: This content is hosted by a third party. To view it, please update your privacy preferences. Manage Settings.

The UK votes for Brexit and it will impact automakers

It's the first morning after the United Kingdom voted for what's become known as Brexit – that is, to leave the European Union and its tariff-free internal market. Now begins a two-year process in which the UK will have to negotiate with the rest of the EU trading bloc, which is its largest export market, about many things. One of them may be tariffs, and that could severely impact any automaker that builds cars in the UK. This doesn't just mean companies that you think of as British, like Mini and Jaguar. Both of those automakers are owned by foreign companies, incidentally. Mini and Rolls-Royce are owned by BMW, Jaguar and Land Rover by Tata Motors of India, and Bentley by the VW Group. Many other automakers produce cars in the UK for sale within that country and also export to the EU. Tariffs could damage the profits of each of these companies, and perhaps cause them to shift manufacturing out of the UK, significantly damaging the country's resurgent manufacturing industry. Autonews Europe dug up some interesting numbers on that last point. Nissan, the country's second-largest auto producer, builds 475k or so cars in the UK but the vast majority are sent abroad. Toyota built 190k cars last year in Britain, of which 75 percent went to the EU and just 10 percent were sold in the country. Investors are skittish at the news. The value of the pound sterling has plummeted by 8 percent as of this writing, at one point yesterday reaching levels not seen since 1985. Shares at Tata Motors, which counts Jaguar and Land Rover as bright jewels in its portfolio, were off by nearly 12 percent according to Autonews Europe. So what happens next? No one's terribly sure, although the feeling seems to be that the jilted EU will impost tariffs of up to 10 percent on UK exports. It's likely that the UK will reciprocate, and thus it'll be more expensive to buy a European-made car in the UK. Both situations will likely negatively affect the country, as both production of new cars and sales to UK consumers will both fall. Evercore Automotive Research figures the combined damage will be roughly $9b in lost profits to automakers, and an as-of-yet unquantified impact on auto production jobs. Perhaps the EU's leaders in Brussels will be in a better mood in two years, and the process won't devolve into a trade war. In the immediate wake of the Brexit vote, though, the mood is grim, the EU leadership is angry, and investors are spooked.