LONDON: Rolls-Royce Motor Cars unveils Black Badge Spectre – the marque’s alter ego, amplified.
In addition to debuting bold exterior finishes, vivid interior details, and innovative opportunities for Bespoke, Black Badge Spectre can summon a four-figure torque output (1,075 Nm), with a record 485kW (659 hp) of power.
This makes Black Badge Spectre the most powerful Rolls-Royce in history.
The decision to craft such a potent motor car was driven by the extraordinary expectations of the marque’s Black Badge clients.
To ensure this philosophy accurately reflected how clients use their motor cars in the field, a group of Rolls-Royce owners granted engineers access to their anonymised driving data, allowing drivetrain specialists to quantitatively analyse their driving behaviour across hundreds of thousands of collective miles.
This revealed that clients exploited maximum power in short pulses more than over extended periods.
This insight provided powerful validation of the marque’s approach, perfectly matching the dramatic, intense character of the most powerful Rolls-Royce ever created – meticulously developed in the image of this bold client group.
For Black Badge Spectre, the concept of formidable bursts of power is taken to an extreme with two powertrain innovations.
Although these functions are new for a Rolls-Royce motor car, they have a historical precedent.
In aircraft powered by the legendary Rolls-Royce Merlin engine, including the Supermarine Spitfire, pilots could obtain a burst of additional power by pushing a switch on the throttle quadrant.
While the robust Merlin engine was easily able to accommodate these temporary pulses, pilots were required to report the use of the function on landing as a precaution to flight engineers – a requirement that does not apply to Black Badge Spectre drivers today.
The first innovation is a unique Infinity Mode, a tribute to the Infinity symbol used to signify a Black Badge Rolls-Royce.
Unlocked by pressing the Infinity ∞ button on the steering wheel, the full 485 kW (659 hp) of power is made available, providing a more direct throttle response to the driver.
Once this mode is activated, the dials become more vibrant to match the change in the motor car’s character.
Black Badge Spectre also features Spirited Mode, which allows the driver to experience a burst of intense, instantaneous acceleration.
When the motor car is stationary, the driver engages this function by fully depressing the brake and throttle at the same time, waiting for a haptic and visual response signalling the car is ready, before fully releasing the brake.
This temporarily amplifies the torque output to a landmark 1075 Nm, unleashing a surge of force and propelling the motor car from 0-100kph in just 4.2 seconds.
The steering weight is increased and the roll stabilisation is adjusted to create more feedback from steering inputs and reduce body-roll during cornering.
Enhanced dampers also increase body control, reducing ‘squatting’ under acceleration or deceleration.
These revisions perfectly balance an enhanced sense of engagement with the effortless operation and fêted Magic Carpet Ride associated with Rolls-Royce motor cars.
Black Badge Spectre makes its global debut in a new Vapour Violet paint finish, a deep black-violet inspired by the neon ambience of 1980s and 1990s club culture – a celebrated reference among many Black Badge clients.
A painted Iced Black bonnet has also been introduced, creating a bold contrast that can be paired with the marque’s palette of 44,000 ‘prêt-à-porter’ colours.
Alternatively, clients can develop a Bespoke hue reserved for their exclusive use, in collaboration with Rolls-Royce Bespoke designers.
