Fire the chauffeur! This new Roller is all about driving enjoyment, says Road Test Editor HOWARD WALKER
Ghost. Never has the name of an automobile so perfectly encapsulated its character. The way this magical machine glides oh-so silently across the blacktop, seemingly suspended on a bed of fluffed-up feathers, is nothing less then ghostly.
As for the surge of power from its mighty twin turbocharged V12 engine as it compresses you firmly, but gently, into the seat back?
Truly spirited
And the only way to describe this car’s jaw-dropping ability to scythe through curves and corners like some highly tuned sports car? Totally, utterly spooky.
Of course, you could characterize Rolls-Royce’s brand new Ghost super-sedan as phantom-like. But that analogy is best reserved for the Ghost’s
more formal sibling.
Here, in fact, is your everyday, drive-it-to-the-mall Roller. While the $380,000 Phantom should, ideally, be steered by a man wearing a peaked cap and answering to the name Jeeves, the $245,000 Ghost is for the selfish, hedonistic enjoyment of the owner.
Don’t think of it as a baby Rolls. In fact it’s only 17 inches shorter than a Phantom, which means it still is close to 18 feet nose to tail. There are Caribbean islands that are smaller!
No, what’s different here is the character of the car. To reveal that many of the Ghost’s greasy bits are shared with BMW’s top-of-the-line 7-series – BMW has owned Rolls-Royce since 1998 – explains where it gets its speed and agility.
And while that big, honking V12 is also derived from the same one powering BMW’s sybaritic 760Li, for the Ghost it’s beefed up to a massive 6.6 liters, to deliver a staggering 570 horsepower. It makes the Ghost, simply, the most powerful Rolls-Royce ever.
Couple that with a Teflon-smooth eight-speed automatic and you have the ability to whoosh from standstill to 60 mph in an unthinkable 4.7 seconds. Gulfstream G5s on takeoff don’t cover ground this quickly!
But the numbers are essentially meaningless. What is so truly, utterly remarkable about the way this car performs is its ghostly silence. Angels breathing, or Marcel Marceau in deep conversation, make more noise than a Ghost wafting along at 100 mph.
And when you step on the gas to shake off those nasty paparazzi, there’s no roaring of engine or jolts from transmission kickdown. No, the V12 simply unleashes its tree-stump-pulling 575 foot-pounds of torque, the 8-speed auto performs its seamless magic, and the car simply lunges towards the horizon as if being released from some invisible catapult.
You, as the lucky driver, take it all in from the elevated, Barcalounger-like comfort of the front throne. All around you is more varnished wood than a Maine boatyard; enough glove-soft leather to start a Hermès franchise!
But the real joy is reserved for rear seat passengers, who get the full royal treatment with a sofa-like bench that wouldn’t look out of place in Architectural Digest.
You enter, in Rolls-Royce tradition, through rear-hinged coach doors, stepping into a cocoon-like wonderland of perforated leather and fold-down picnic tables. Toggle a switch on the center armrest and the seatback reclines to encourage in-journey snoozing. I never wanted to leave.
The Rolls-Royce engineers have created an air suspension system designed to keep the car perfectly flat and level, even when the car is cornering hard. So no slithering from side to side when the driver is having way too much fun. And, I’m told the system is so sensitive that it can detect, and compensate for a single passenger shifting his or her weight from one butt cheek to the other. Which may fall into the category of a little too much information.
Make no mistake this is no mere automobile. Think of it as a rolling bubble of serenity, an escape capsule from the daily commute. It’s a car to relish every day, instead of just for special occasions.
This is certainly one friendly Ghost I’d prefer to a Phantom any day!
For more information on Rolls-Royce vehicles, please visit
http://www.rolls-roycemotorcars.com/