Wheels Mag special:Sultan Of Brunei Garage!

[HBS]

For some unknown reason,Sultan allowed this magazine to take an in-depth look on the world most talked garages throughout all the motorhead & enthusiasts.
Wheels mag(Issue:?? ) has been allowed to talk with some of the mechanics(that still work) on how sultan's obsession has grown uncontrollable & how the big name of automotive player deals with his crazy consumption of automobiles.

Here is some of the scanned page.:









Some of crazy trivia about Sultan's auto stuff is:

-The car was come in bulk order with different colour because sultan wanted to use different colour everyday.

-Each of car has been placed in colour coded section,allowing sultan to easily navigate through the different section of garage without having difficulties to find which colour he like the most for each different day.

-Sultan definitely love Mercedes Benz more than any other brand,because it is the most on his garage.

-Some of world rarest custom,like Ferrari F60 Mythos,Ferrari FX,F275 Turbo,Estate wagon 456,Facelifted XJ220,AMG-hand built classic with modern touch like the SL Gullwing,& few others custom made Astons,Jaguar,Bentley & Roll Royce.

-Sultan also love concept car.If it wouldnt be made by the automaker itself,he will take the concept car to be made just for him.Some example are Honda's 1989 NS-X(but he had several of the true production model) & Vivo Argento Concept(Later production model is S2000) .

-Sultan also love racing car.In fact some of F1 model also presented in his garage,mainly from William,Mercedes & Ferrari & some other privateer running chassis.There also other racing car from different league like 24 Hours of Le Mans(mostly World Sportscar series chassis from late 80's to 90's.)
Some of the rare racing car turned to road version are Dauer 962LM,Konig C962,& Schuppann 962CR.(All derived from the same 956B-962C Porsche Sportscar racing chassis that compete on World Sportscar Championship back in early 80's to the early 90's)

-Pinifarina also dedicated "The Sultan Room" during his reign of custom made orders.It was unknown whether the complex for that dedicated room are still opening since Sultan pretty much slowing down on his auto interest back in early 2000's.

Related: The rotting supercars of Brunei's Sultan

 

[Dayline668]

Any more online article that can read about this..?

 

[EvolutionZ]

yup, me interested to read more bout it...its dam* lotsa cars....

 

[DanzEterna]

me too..

 

[K2 stanley]

Now we only know what's mean collection, F40 is limited? i dun think this word apply in sultan Brunei.

 

[HBS]

Sorry..this one has been on my HDD for quite sometimes(I think last year?Cant remember it) & I think its better to post it here....Forgot where I take all the scan of this,but kudos to the magazine owner who done a great job for scanning all the important page.
It was 6-7 pages special but this is the only that I can take...other uncovered pages are because the hosting server was running out(Photobucket)

BTW,some of classic car mags had also running a talk with sultan garage & apart from all of this collection,Sultan reportedly still updated his personal collection,although it was not as extravagant as it was use to.
The new private collection are said to be bullet-proofed Rolls Royce Phantoms,$2 Maybach 62s, Ferrari 599 GTB, Ferrari FXX and a one-off Ferrari 575 Covertible. Further more,his Lamborghini Murcielago LP640s (white, baby blue and yellow) or his new 2007 S-Class are all in black, more than a dozen for the country's ministers.

I also got a Car Design Book,a gift from my oversea mate during my college year on industrial design course.The book also covered some of greatest design & this one also got covered on the book.

PININFARINA ARGENTO VIVO (QUICK SILVER)

Pininfarina the famous Italian design house have been involved with the design of all shorts of vehicles since its’ humble beginnings over seventy years ago. Locomotives, boats, aircraft among others, but famously, cars. Today the company has two manufacturing plants and research and development facility with its own wind tunnel.

The Company most closely associated with Pininfarina is Ferrari. Since 1952 a total of 163 different types of Ferrari are Pininfarina designs, including the 250 GT Coupe, Dino 246 GT, Daytona, Testarossa, F40, F50, 360 Modena and the fantastic Ferrari P4/P5.

The Aregento Vivo was initially a formal and technological research prototype built in conjunction with Honda. This car was presented to the International press at the Tokyo motor show in 1995 by Sergio Pininfarina and Nabuhiko Kawamoto, President of Honda. The car won the “Golden Market Trophy” awarded by the Japanese magazine “Car Styling” and the “Best in Show” from the American magazine “Auto Week”.

According to Pininfarina the “Argento Vivo represents a refined exercise in style, an image car that projects its personality into the world of automobiles. With innovative solutions, like that developed for the convertible hard top, which can slide back automatically and then be housed in a space behind the two seats leaving the luggage compartment unencumbered. Argento Vivo is an automobile that marries hot Latin passion; a love for sporty aggressive cars, so typical of the Italian tradition, with the rationality of a sophisticated brand… Argento Vivo evokes the concept of a sporty and technological elegance. There are few outstanding points of interest, including the return to the two-tone colour scheme, undertaken with a skilful blend of cutting edge fine materials. Aluminium, which with the basic structure constitutes the heart and spine of the new Spider Pininfarina, becomes a fundamental component in the two-tone interplay and in the enlivening of the cars surfaces. The engine and luggage compartments, the roof structure, the air intakes and the exhaust vents are all made of this material, which calls to mind sporty and competition vehicles of extreme class and, at the same time offers a sense of solidity, protection and functional refinement. The rest of the bodywork, on the other hand, is made of resin painted dark blue, a sort of support into which the aluminium parts are inset.”

The Argento Vivo evolved from the Honda based car into further cars based on brand new Mercedes SL600 chassis. Brakes, suspension and gearbox are all AMG as is the 7.3 litre V12 engine. Developing 655 hp, the performance of the Argento Vivo is devastating, 0-60 in less than 4 seconds and a top speed of over 175 mph.

The enterior is custom built by Pininfarina especially for the Argento Vivo and consists of carbon fibre door panels, dashboard, centre console and special leather and carbon fibre seats.

Four of these cars were built for the Royal Family of Brunei. The original cost was over $2,500,000 for each car. Two remain in the Royal Garages in Brunei; the other two are at secret locations in England. The intense secrecy surrounding the special automotive projects that the Royal Family commissioned means that the very existence of these cars is unknown to anyone except those closely involved in the projects, indeed no pictures or details of these cars have been made available. With the Royal Family cutting back on their lavish spending, the specialist workshop facility that Pininfarina used for the construction of the special “Brunei” cars has now been closed, meaning that Argento Vivo will probably be the last Pininfarina Mercedes designed and coach built car.









After successful collaboration Honda-Pininfarina through the 80's Honda HP-X project & final refinement of production-ready NSX in 1990,Honda went out again with the company to another sportscar-based product that tribute to the old S series roadster.So there it goes the Vivo Argento Concept that soon turned out with more refined,production shape that named Honda S2000.
But as Sultan think the car design deserve a working powerplant,he does commissioned the car to be built as real-car.
So apart from the car in-fact was a co-joined effort between the japanese & the Italian designhouse,the car was taken from the japanese portfolio & to be turned under Mercedes-AMG collaborative project.

So the final word,the ultra expensive modern-retro "S2000" that was faithful replica from the drawing board,or the real,production-model,modern-classy looking,Honda-badged S2000? you decide...

 

[driftkingII]

i remembered the last posting in zth about Sultan Brunei cars was the one he left to root... pity those awesome cars..

 

[consonar]

damnnnnnnnnnn.. this is so crazy dude.....

best giler!!!!!!!!!

 

[skazareth]

i really need the article about these massive collection of Sultan Brunei. It always a rumor of it in the net like some say 5000 of it.. 8000 of it.. even i found 19000 of it. Not sure which one is true (yea, 5000 is still CRAZY number eyyyh?!....). And some say only 5km has been used then let it "sleep" in the garage for years..... something like that.

regarding that Argento Vivo... it is darn fukkin ugly. hahahaha!

 

[shah5755]

wishing he is gud enough to giv me one of his collection
too many of it and i think if he use one car per day in a year still cannot use all of it

 

[sooieweng]

Does d sultan of johore same as sultan brunei?....just wonder d sultan johore take our tax payer money to buy thosetoys?....

 

[Ariel Katana]

Oh man..It is my dream to have big collections in garage like Sultan Brunei has but i have to be rich like him lor...

 

[jdm 19]

he's damn rich man...

 

[Redline_club]

this post b4 right?

 

[skazareth]

i just hate the tax-payer issue bcs it will never end.
feel itchy? scratch it.