Bugatti Royale

Bugatti Type 41
Overview
Manufacturer Bugatti
Also called Bugatti Royale
Production 1927–1933
(6 produced)
Body and chassis
Class Luxury car, Classic car
Body style Berline, coupé, cabriolet, roadster
Layout FR layout
Powertrain
Engine 12,763 cc (12.7 L) (779 cu in.).straight-8
Transmission 3-speed manual
Dimensions
Wheelbase ~4.3 m (169.3 in)
Length ~6.4 m (252.0 in)
Curb weight ~3,175 kg (7,000 lb)

The Bugatti Type 41, better known as the Royale, is a large luxury car built from 1927 to 1933 with a 4.3 m (169.3 in) wheelbase and 6.4 m (21 ft) overall length. It weighs approximately 3175 kg (7000 lb) and uses a 12.7 L (12763 cc/778 cu in) straight-eight engine. For comparison, against the modern Rolls-Royce Phantom (produced from 2003 onward), the Royale is about 20% longer, and more than 25% heavier. This makes the Royale one of the largest cars in the world.[1][2]

Ettore Bugatti planned to build twenty-five of these cars, sell them to royalty and to be the most luxurious car ever. But even European royalty was not buying such things during the Great Depression, and Bugatti was able to sell only three of the six made.

Design

Type 41 radiator cap

Crafted by Ettore Bugatti, the Type 41 is said to have come about because he took exception to the comments of an English lady who compared his cars unfavourably with those of Rolls-Royce.[1][3]

Engine

The prototype had a near 15-litre capacity engine. The production version, its stroke reduced from 150 mm (5.9 in) to 130 mm (5.1 in) had a displacement of 12.7 litres.[4][5] The engine was built around a single huge block, and at (approx. 4.5 ft (1.4 m) long x 3.5 ft (1.1 m) high), is one of the largest automobile engines ever made,[4] producing 205–224 kW (275–300 hp).[4][6] Its eight cylinders, bored to 125 mm (4.9 in) and with a stroke length of 130 mm (5.1 in),[4][5] each displaced more than the entire engine of the contemporary Type 40 touring car.[4] It had 3 valves per cylinder (two inlet:one exhaust) driven by a centrally positioned single overhead camshaft.[4][5] Three bearings and only a single custom carburettor was needed. The engine was based on an aero-engine design that had been designed for the French Air Ministry, but never produced in that configuration.[4]

The engine block and cylinder head were cast in one unit. Grinding of the engine valves was a regular maintenance requirement, and removing the engine valves for grinding required removing and disassembling the large cast iron engine.[5]

Chassis

The chassis was understandably substantial, with a conventional semi-elliptic leaf spring suspension arrangement at the front.[4][7] At the rear the forward-facing Bugatti quarter-elliptics were supplemented by a second set facing to the rear.[4]

Strangely, for the modern day observer, the aluminium clutch box was attached to the chassis, not to the engine, and the gear box, also in aluminium, was attached to the rear axle, so was part of the unsprung mass of the suspension. The reason placing clutch and gearbox at such odd locations was reducing noise, so increasing comfort inside the cars, a difficult problem in those days. On the other hand, in view of the Royale's huge mass, placing the gearbox on the rear axle did not present a driveability problem.

Massive brake shoes were mechanically operated via cable controls: the brakes were effective but without servo-assistance required significant muscle power from the driver.[4] The car's light alloy "Roue Royale" wheels measured 610 millimetres (24 in) in diameter and were cast in one piece with the brake drums.[7]

Controls

Reflecting some tradition-based fashions of the time, the driver was confronted by a series of knobs of whalebone, while the steering wheel was covered with walnut.[4]

Performance

A road test performed in 1926 by W. F. Bradley at the request of Ettore Bugatti for the Autocar magazine proved how exquisite chassis construction allowed very good and balanced handling at speed, similar to smaller Bugatti sports cars, despite the car's weight and size.[8]

All Royales were individually bodied. The radiator cap was a posed elephant, a sculpture by Ettore's brother Rembrandt Bugatti.

Production

In 1928 Ettore Bugatti asserted that "this year King Alfonso of Spain will receive his Royale", but the Spanish king was deposed without taking delivery of a Royale, and the first of the cars to find a customer was not delivered until 1932.[4] The Royale with a basic chassis price of $30,000, was launched just as the world economy began to deteriorate into the 1930s Great Depression. Six Royales were built between 1929 and 1933, with just three sold to external customers. Intended for royalty, none was eventually sold to any royals, and Bugatti even refused to sell one to King Zog of Albania, claiming that "the man's table manners are beyond belief!"[6]

All six production Royales still exist, the prototype was destroyed in an accident in 1931, and each has a different body, some having been rebodied several times.

41.110 - Coupé Napoleon

Chassis no.41.110, known as the Coupé Napoleon, at home in the Musée National de l'Automobile de Mulhouse

41.111 - Coupé de ville Binder

The Royale Coupe De Ville Binder 41.111 at the 2004 Goodwood Revival

41.121 - Cabriolet Weinberger

Chassis no.41.121, Bugatti Type 41 Royale 'Weinberger Cabriolet' 1931

41.131 - Limousine Park-Ward

Chassis no.41.131, known as the Limousine Park-Ward, at home in the Musée National de l'Automobile de Mulhouse

41.141 - Kellner car

41.150 - Berline de Voyage

Most of the engines intended for the Royale were derated and found their way into a series of high-speed Bugatti railcars.

French National Railway SNCF

To utilize the remaining 23 engines after the final Royale was built, Bugatti built a railcar powered by either two or four of the eight-cylinder units. Seventy-nine were built for the French National Railway SNCF, using a further 186 engines, the last of them remaining in regular use until 1956[4] or 1958 (sources differ). The railcar turned the Royale project from an economic failure into a commercial success for Bugatti. The engines were derated to produce only about 200 hp, but even in this form they provided excellent performance.[4] One of the railcars took a world average speed record of 122 mph (196 km/h) for 43.9 miles (70.7 km).

Media related to Bugatti railcar at Wikimedia Commons

Replica cars

The brothers Schlumpf replica of the Royale Esders Coupe on display at the 2006 Paris Motor Show
Replica of Coupe Napoleon, made for the French film Rebus with an American V8 engine, now residing in the Sinsheim Auto & Technik Museum

In light of the rarity of the Type 41 and its associated price, it is unsurprising that some replicas have been made.

The Schlumpf brothers so liked the original Dr Armand Esders coupe body on chassis 41.111, using original Bugatti parts they had a replica made of the car. It now resides with the two originals they purchased at the Musée National de l'Automobile de Mulhouse.[10]

The late Tom Wheatcroft commissioned Ashton Keynes Vintage Restorations to build an exact replica of Bugatti's personal car, the Coupe Napoleon (chassis number 41.110), for his Donington Grand Prix Collection in England. It has since been sold and left the collection. So good was the replica, that when the Kellner car needed a replacement piston, its then Japanese owners commissioned South Cerney Engineering part of AKVR to provide a replacement.[1]

On May 24, 2008, Prince Joachim of Denmark on the day of his wedding to Princess Marie (formerly Marie Cavallier) had Wheatcroft's replica waiting outside Møgeltønder Church to drive the newly married couple to Schackenborg Castle.

The much smaller Panther De Ville (produced between 1974 and 1985) consciously resembled the Type 41.

Reunion

In 2007 to celebrate the Royale's eightieth anniversary, five of the six cars were on display at the Goodwood Festival of Speed.[10]

In the 1985 Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance, all six appeared together on display.[16]

In literature

A Bugatti Royale features in the 2012 book Lucia on Holiday by Guy Fraser-Sampson, an addition to the Mapp and Lucia series of novels by E.F.Benson. In the story Major Mapp-Flint is asked by a maharajah to drive the car from Paris to Bellagio, but he drives so badly and inflicts so much damage that the maharajah has the car driven into Lake Como.

The Bugatti Royale 41.151 Berline de Voyage 1931 also features throughout the 2014 book The Eye of Zoltar, book 3 of The Last Dragonslayer series by Jasper Fforde. The car is referenced ten times within the book. The protagonist Jennifer Strange describes her choice of car "After looking at several I'd chosen a massive vintage car called a Bugatti Royale. Inside it was sumptuously comfortable, and outside, the bonnet was so long that in misty weather it was hard to make out the hood ornament."

The Bugatti Royale features in the David Grossman book The Zigzag Kid

A blood-red Bugatti type 41 Royale Coupe de Ville appears in Leslie Charteris' Vendetta For the Saint (Doubleday 1964, ghostwritten by Harry Harrison) as a rental car for Simon Templar.

See also

Notes

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 Buckley 2002.
  2. Pattinson 2009, pp. 1, 4, 5.
  3. Kimes 1990, p. 640.
  4. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 Conway 1969, pp. 17–20.
  5. 1 2 3 4 Rogliatti 1973, p. 232.
  6. 1 2 Kimes 1990, p. 632.
  7. 1 2 Rogliatti 1973, p. 233.
  8. "Royale Driving Report". bugatti.com. Retrieved 2013-07-15.
  9. "The Most Beautiful Bugatti Royale Ever Made". bugattipage.com. Retrieved 2009-01-03.
  10. 1 2 3 4 "Bugatti Type 41 Royale Binder Coupe de Ville". ultimatecarpage.com. Retrieved 2009-01-01.
  11. 1 2 3 "Bugatti Type 41 Royale Weinberger Cabriolet". ultimatecarpage.com. Retrieved 2009-01-01.
  12. "Bugatti Type 41 Royale Park Ward Limousine". ultimatecarpage.com. Retrieved 2009-01-01.
  13. "The Cunningham Museum". briggscunningham.com. Archived from the original on September 22, 2008. Retrieved 2009-01-01.
  14. "Kellner Bugatti T41 Royale". coachbuild.com. Retrieved 2009-01-01.
  15. "Bugatti Type 41 Royale Kellner Coach". ultimatecarpage.com. Retrieved 2009-01-01.
  16. "All Six Bugatti Royale Cars Displayed Together For First Time". AP News Archive. Associated Press. 27 August 1985.

References

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Bugatti Type 41.
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