Rolls-Royce wants you to spend half a million dollars on the eight model of its legendary Phantom series, which is hands-down the most luxurious car on the market today. But what makes Phantom so special? You’ll need to read till the end to find out.
A Hefty Price Tag
$500,000 is an amount that most people can’t even afford to spend on a house, let alone a car. But there are certain deep-pocketed hedonists who don’t mind dipping into their millions to purchase a car as extravagant as Rolls-Royce’s latest Phantom model, which is eighth in the line to carry its prestigious name.
Rolls-Royce’s global communications director, Richard Carter, says that the company doesn’t think of Phantom as a car at all. The luxurious automobile has extra-thick laminated side windows which drown out all the sounds of the outside world.
Passengers in the back seats are treated to a wine cellar with a drink chiller in the center and crystal tumblers engraved with the Rolls-Royce symbol. The back of the front seats are fitted with infotainment displays and trays for dining or working.
Sound-Proof Isn’t the Safest
Most people would be happy with a Rolls-Royce the company has taken the automotive game up a few notches in the new luxury Phantom, which employs an isolation chamber that shuts the whole world out, making it the quietest car ever made.
But this feature comes with an increased risk of accidents, according to Popular Science. Phantom’s isolation chamber has made it somewhat unsafe to drive because it prevents drivers from hearing any emergency sirens or fast approaching cars from behind.
The engineers behind this masterpiece of a car say that they’ve used more aluminum than steel to build since aluminum is lighter than steel and by lowering Phantom’s weight they have been able to employ more sound dampening mechanism to make the car sound-proof.
Of course that company could have gone a step further to completely isolate the chamber but after the Rolls-Royce patrons started voicing their concern over the risk of sound-proof feature in an automobile, the company abandoned plans to make the cars any quieter than they already were.
Clever Engineering
Rolls-Royce touted that the 2018 model of its legendary Phantom line employs 300 pounds of built-in sound insulation. The car’s bulkhead and back doors are insulated with a double layer of aluminum with a sheet of sound-absorbing foam in between so that the passengers can revel in the beauty of the car, without any disturbances from the outside world.
The 0.2-inch thick glass windows and insulated tires also help in making the car as sound-proof as possible. The engineers have lined the inside of the tires with foam to damp the road noise.
The clever engineering goes a step further to insure that the sound proof feature is only effective for those who need them in the rear passenger seats – but not for the driver in the front who needs to pay attention to the sounds of sirens and car horns for safety purposes.
An Isolation Chamber
Since most of the Phantom patrons have chauffeurs who don’t need noise cancellation, Goodwood engineers decided to add an additional privacy feature for the backseat passengers through a luxurious option called the Privacy Suite.
This new options magically transforms the car’s rear cabin into an isolated bubble, separated from the front cabin with an electrochromic glass panel or a physical barrier. The passenger can just opt for the glass panel if they’d like to see the road ahead, but these panels can magically transform into frosted glass shield with a touch of button if the passengers want more privacy in the back.
The panel has a frequency-specific compound which makes it impossible for the driver to hear what’s being said in the back, but in case they need to get in touch with the driver, there is an intercom in the car for communication. If passengers need to hand something to the driver they can deploy a small opening in the wall to allow the exchange of items between the two cabins.