VW’s epic “W” Story

Chapter 4 – The Word’s Fastest Frenchman

Moving from Piech’s one pet project to the next:

The story starts with the Bugatti EB 118, the first design prototype created after the accusation of the prestigious Bugatti moniker and conceptualized in record time. The nomenclature stood for the first concept car with 18 cylinders. The luxury coupé with its specifically designed 6.25-liter front engine was presented by the newly revived auto marque at the Paris Motor Show for the first time in October 1998. 

So the EB110 in itself was quite groundbreaking but it used a fairly conventional V12, however, the quad-turbo setup was way ahead of its time and the fact that it could put all its power down without exploding was quite an achievement for the time. But the EB110 was far from the first step. Everything from the W8 to the W12 and the rest of the 18-cylinder concepts which include the EB218 luxury sports saloon from 1999, including Mr. Piech’s claim of creating a wild production supercar back in the year 2000, with an output of 1001 horsepower seemed outlandish at the time. Ferdinand Piëch’s premise was clear: a Bugatti had to be instantly recognizable everywhere and by everyone. His reference point was Ettore Bugatti’s motto: “If it’s comparable, it’s not a Bugatti” and boy did he deliver. 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

The hype was all real and it culminated with the unveiling of the first almost production-ready Bugatti EB 16·4 Veyron when it was introduced at the Paris Motor show in September 2000 (coincidentally the same year as the W8 Passat). This marked the final specifications of the car and the only notable change was a 16-cylinder motor instead of the 18 because let’s face it, you’d need a full-size pickup truck just to carry the 18-cylinder motor. And to deliver the promised power figures, they opted to turbo this already ginormous engine with the addition of 4-turbos (could have just kept the two cylinders instead I guess) since they knew it was possible thanks in part to the EB110. So the final engine was an 8-liter W16 created by joining two WR8’s (yes the same basic WR8 from the Passat but with a lot of improvements) and the final figures sat at 1001 PS and 1250 nm of torque. So the next time you find someone driving a W8 Passat, let them know that they own half a Veyron or at least if they decide to twin-turbo the thing.