There’s No Such Thing As A ‘Cheap’ Bugatti Veyron
Even when it’s in a million pieces, a Veyron costs a lot. Putting it back together again takes even more money…and some creative thinking.
You really do get what you pay for. If you skimp on your hotel room during a vacation, don’t expect a five-star experience. Is there a place offering a too-good-to-be-true price on laser vision correction surgery? Use your still-functioning eyes to look for another business that charges a realistic amount and won’t ruin your peepers. If you find someone willing to sell you a Bugatti Veyron for $300,000, know that it’s probably definitely going to have just as many problems.
In this video from VINwiki, Youtube star Freddy “Tavarish” Hernandez breaks down some of them. Remember that Veyron that got driven into Texas’s Gulf Bay several years ago? Since that fateful day, it’s lived a complicated life. At one point, it was taken apart and sitting in a warehouse. VINwiki‘s CEO Ed Bolian approached Hernandez about getting it. Hernandez is no stranger to exotic cars that need a lot of work. He’s turned wrenches on a variety of them, including a fire-ravaged Ferrari F355 and a Bentley Continental GT that led a sordid and tortured existence in Russia.
The Veyron is on a different level for several reasons:
1.) Access. You can get a Haynes manual that will help you put an Acura Integra or Ford Mustang back together. You can’t exactly do that with a $1,000,000 megacar that’s designed to go more than 250 mph. Even if you can afford the parts you need for it, Bugatti isn’t willing to sell them a la carte to those trying to resurrect a Veyron on their own. And the Veyron owners community isn’t like it is for more common cars. As Hernandez puts it, “There’s not a Veyron owners association that you can say, ‘Hey, how do you put these cars back together?'”
2.) Parts. Some shops that customize Veyrons may have certain stock parts they removed from the cars they worked on, but there are some pieces that just can’t be found. It’s not as if Bugatti cranked Veyrons out the way Ford pumps out F-150s. One of those hard-to-find pieces is a wiring diagram. According to Hernandez, he would’ve had to make it from scratch. “You’d basically have to trace back everything. You’d have to look up part numbers” and put months of work into the process.
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3.) Unknowns. Even though the Veyron was disassembled, it still wasn’t completely clear just how damaged it was. If the radiators were trashed, Hernandez could replace them with custom-made units. But if the engine sucked in salt water and died, then the whole project would be prohibitively expensive.
4.) Money. An initial price of $300,000 is high enough. Trying to turn that substantial investment into a driveable car can quickly get a lot more expensive. Even if the car was in pristine condition and had been sitting unused for a few years, just getting it back into what Bugatti deems roadworthy condition would’ve cost $80,000 in wheels and tires, and another $20,000 in service. The Veyron Hernandez discusses here was a long way from pristine and all of its unknown problems could’ve cost a fortune. According to Hernandez, “If something goes wrong on a Veyron, you’re spending a quarter million dollars and that’s a margin of error that’s insurmountable.”
Some optimistic (and slightly crazy) person out there paid the asking price for all of this financially draining frustration. There’s still a chance Hernandez will get his hands on it, though. He has a feeling that that misguided soul will realize what they’ve gotten themselves into, bail, and put the Veyron back on the market in six months.
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