Have you always wanted a car like a Rolls-Royce, Lamborghini, or a Bentley, but find that your foolish decision not to be born into a crapton of money keeps getting in the way? It stings. But there’s a solution! Savvy car-buyers know that there’s always a way to get stripper, poverty-spec versions of nearly any car!
I should clarify that last statement just a bit: there’s no way to do that, at all. Hell, it’s hard even to get a base-model Nissan Versa; there’s no way Lamborghini is going to try and sell a stripper Aventador for 1/3 the price.
But I can dream. And I did, inspired by yesterday’s Answers Of The Day, too.
Let me tell you, de-contenting supercars and crazy expensive luxury cars, even just virtually, with pixels, is incredibly satisfying. It hits some deep, filthy urge within me to debase and defile, to devalue, to drag the angels down from the aether and befoul them with the filth of where I exist.
If these were a thing, they’d be an insane mash-up between incredibly high quality design and construction and absurdly cheap detailing and some of the most aggressive cost-cutting imaginable. To get the prices low enough, these cars would have to remove everything non-fundamental to the car and either just ditch it or replace it with the cheapest possible solution. These would bridge the lowest end of the market and the highest in a way never seen before.
Plus, look how affordable these are! I’m certain I’m not the first to do this, but let’s just look at this quick batch of affordable supercars:
I’m told Lamborghini named this car after the Italian word for cheapskate, taccagano. If that’s offensive, I apologize — I don’t speak Italian. This Aventador is about a third the price of a full-spec one and drives just as well — maybe better, since it’s at least 400 lbs lighter.
It rides on steelies, the bumpers are unpainted, the lights are much cheaper, and there’s no liner in the trunk, among other things.
Rolls-Royce names their cars after dead things: Spirit, Shadow, Phantom, Ghost — and I wanted to keep that naming convention for their very affordable offering. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find a word that meant “poor ghost.” I considered “Silver Corpse” as well, if you like that better.
Also, even though you can’t see it, I got almost giddy thinking about the huge, black cardboard trunk liner this car has. There’s no insulation under it or anything — it’s just a big, black-coated shaped piece of rugged cardboard. Also, the floor mats in the rear are just black rubber.
I think I like the Conti DX the best. Did you know Bentley, in my mind, was able to replace every piece of lighting equipment on the Conti GX with a cheap, off-the-shelf unit? Those headlights are just old sealed-beams!
The grille plastic is super flimsy, too, and some owners have reported that they melt in hot weather — but it’s just a $40 service part, so who really cares?
I also did up a quick look at the interior of the Conti DX. There’s some parts pulled from the VW parts bin in here, and you have your choice of three seat fabrics. The center screen/NAV/infotainment system is replaced with a backing plate/radio mounting system. This one is single-DIN, but for an extra $20, you can order the double-DIN one.
I figured since Mercedes was bringing back the Maybach name for their highest-spec S600, maybe they could buy the rights to another defunct German marque’s name for the low-end. DKW (German for the little wonder) was a very respected lower-end marque that was part of the Auto Union. Sure, VW owns those names now, but I bet they’d be happy to sell off DKW for this.
The DKW-spec version of the S600 uses 3-lug wheels from the Smart lineup, and instead of the V12, an inline 4 from the CLA, with appropriate badge changes. All the room of the big S-class without all the cost! Perfect!
Man, I wish this sort of thing actually existed.
Contact the author at jason@jalopnik.com.