German Car Forum

Rolls Royce have shown their LWB Phantom with a divider.



I think Rolls-Royce have done a better job in the past.

Phantom V


Mulliner Park Ward Silver Spur Limousine


1999 Silver Spur Limousine


Bentley Arnage Limousine

Meh it looks a bit bulky if you ask me... and the glass for some reason looks like plastic, because of the way it's shaped. I'd have one without, doesn't matter what goes on in the car, nothing to hide.

Not nice looks like the protection glass around hockey rinks..

Not that great. As I posted in another thread, I'd rather they make it retractable, and also able to be made opaque, whether through a cover or through electrochromatic glass like various sunroofs. Neither does it look that elegant.

I would have thought that a LWB Phantom would have enough room for them to make it 'flat' - ie, doesn't have to bulge out to accommodate the front seats. I think that's the culprit, otherwise a flat divider would be much easier to make retractable or with another covering layer.

As for looks, it is a little uninspiring, if at least neat. The Phantom V and the Silver Spur are my favourites there.

Maybach did a much better job with the divider - I don't think it is great, but it is far superior to the Phantom's IMO.


As far as I'm concerned, it is very remiss of Rolls-Royce not to have a fully retractable glass window for the divider.

Yeah. I'm not that keen on the design of the Maybach's divider, though it is a little better than the latest Phantom's, IMO (not to start an argument though), but the frosted look with retractable ability is definitely a need. The functionality is much better, pretty much exactly what I had in mind I suppose.

The little porthole on the Phantom's might be somehow traditional, but in this day and age I'd say it's more an anachronism, and unforgiveable. You might not need the interior to be a gadget-fest, but this is silly.

I sure if you asked RR, or a different company, they'd make what ever you wanted!

I would hope so. Then again, for that car, and for that price, I don't think it's too much for me to expect that they could have got it right first time.

The Arnage RL has the best rear seat setup if you ask me.

Well that goes without saying but I still think a fully retractable glass partition is the standard expectation - with this you have to scream instructions to your driver though a little aperture - very 1930's

I agree whole-heartedly SV

Looks pretty wild inside.... so damn fancy... Cant imagine people need so much.... The glass divider looks like a Deli compartment!

Nice pictures. I think the LWB Phantom's divider glass looks like one of those cigar closets with the built-in humidifier controls. I think the new design may be considered more appealing to the new owners. It looks chic, higher-tech, but still retains a RR touch. The market for Phantoms has changed. Premiership footballers, golfers, athletes, musicians and twenty-somethings drive Phantoms today. The old Phantom IV, V were owned by royalty and only the wealthiest of industrialists so it was old money. It would have been impossible for even the most successful footballers to own a Phantom in the 1960s. Personally, I prefer the glass divider and cabinetry of Phantom V. It retains the English country estate look that I prefer.

Roberto, is that fourth picture a Silver Spur Limousine? That does not look like the full-length PW Limousine. In the late 1990s, RR released a variant unofficially, or perhaps officially, called Silver Spur w/ Division. The car was extended enough for rear-facing jumpseats to be installed and only had room for the divider. A version of this car was on eBay about a year ago and had been owned by the chairman of Newcastle United FC. I believe it was one of, if not the final Park Ward Limousine chassis.

This is the car I posted earlier:

That is so true. The Phantom VI was outrageously expensive, costing around three times as much as the current model. This was mostly due to the fact that it was completely hand made over a period approaching nearly two years.

This Phantom VI belongs to the Japanese Royal family.

It can be quite difficult to tell the difference between a late Phantom V and a Phantom VI - most of the differences are mechanical. The early Phantom VI's had "suicide" doors like the Phantom V, but these were changed to normal doors sometime in the 1970's. 516 Phantom V's were built from 1959 to 1968, and 374 Phantom VI's from 1968 to 1991 - mostly by Mulliner Park Ward, Rolls-Royce's special coachbuilder who hand-built the most exclusive Rolls-Royce and Bentley cars.

H.J. Mulliner and Park Ward were originally two separate companies. Park ward were bought by Rolls-Royce in 1939 and H.J. Mulliner in 1959 - the company then became Mulliner Park Ward.

The beautiful interior of the Phantom V which I posted earlier was a James Young model from around 1968. James Young was another London coachbuilder that was established in 1863. I personally have always liked the James Young designs more than the Mulliner Park Ward ones - they are more elegant and stylish IMO.




Just on coachbuilders:

After WW2 the market for coachbuilt vehicles was very small. In 1968 when the Phantom VI was launched it was already a relic from a different era - still made with a separate chassis and a completely hand built body.

The famous English coachbuilders were Gurney Nutting Ltd, James Young Ltd, Hooper, Windovers, Barker, and H.J. Mulliner.

Its amazing how the newer ones are so different.... boy have times changed and needs too obviously!

Roberto, I had that picture of the shorter RR limousine on my old computer. I believe it was offered on eBay as well. Kingsway Cars has one for sale in Hong Kong. It's identical to the one you posted and they refer to it as Silver Spur - Park Ward w/ Division. They have a restored 1974 Phantom VI for over $3-million HK!

The James Young designs are quite splendid, but probably not my favorite. Here's one he built for Bruce Lee. It looks like someone imported it to America. Notice the ninja stars and what looks to be a PPK handgun in the bottom picture.
http://www.mxbid.com/1965_rollslee.html

That James Young Phantom is a particularly beautiful example, but as you said, by the end of WW2, the coachbuilding industry was bound for collapse. Hooper stopped doing coachbuilding work in the late-50s and that was a terrible shame. I preferred Hooper bodies to all the other coachbuilders, including James Young. Some of the non-English coachbuilders engineered great bodies also. Nordberg in Sweden built a nice Silver Cloud or Silver Wraith. I've always had an interest in Frua's modified Phantoms. They may not be considered the prettiest, but the creativity is sublime in my opinion.

My favorite coachbuilt car must be a Hooper Silver Cloud 1958 in the Hans Guenter Zachs collection. Have a look. It's the fifth picture from the bottom on the picture menu on the far right side of the page.
http://www.rolls-royce-sammlung.de/eng/main.html

Interesting car 450SEL 6.9, and rare too.

Yes you're right about that Alex, these old cars were dinosaurs even in their own time. When compared to their contemporary Mercedes-Benz models, these cars were just embarrassing from a technical perspective. However, from a purely aesthetic perspective, there is nothing else quite like them in the world - they epitomize post-war luxury and status-symbolism.

As unremarkable as the Phantom's divider is, at least it's not as hideous as this.



I don't understand why Maybach chose to use a fabric curtain that looks like your grandmother's underwear - why didn't they opt for an opaque blind, like the one in this Rolls-Royce silver Spur limousine (below).

That's a very gruesome choice of fabric. Maybe Maybach used it to match the alcantara interior. I have a very nice example of a Rolls-Royce Silver Spur Touring Limousine. It sold for nearly $2-million HK. The touring version has a third small window behind the extended passenger door. The Park Ward Limousine's glass extension is between the front and rear doors. The Touring Limousine looks more stately. I'm not sure how to post the pictures. It seems every picture is posted through imageshack.

Thanks, Roberto. I knew how to post pictures in other forums like Benzword. I just didn't hear about imageshack until a few days ago. It seems like a useful service. If my bets on the stock market turn out proper this week, I'll send them a few dollars.

The first picture below is a Touring Limousine and looks to be in great condition. I believe all RR Silver Spur Limousines post-1997 no longer had the small third window. Picture Two is a more unique limousine. It's still a Touring Limousine, but has later model Silver Spur wheels and has been armoured. Pity, I think it was only armoured up to handgun level or B4 standard. I really didn't like the post-1997 limousines much. The Touring Limousine resembled the Phantom V, VI, but the later cars reminded me of American limousines. Yuck!





Here's the later-model limousine

450SEL 6.9, I saw this armoured Silver Spur for sale in London.

http://www.frankdale.com/carView.asp?carID=491

Also you may find this one interesting - actually, I think it's the same one (middle picture) you posted above.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Park_Ward.JPG

The wikipedia car is the same vehicle. The plates are the same. It's only armoured to handgun-class and is ridiculously expensive. For $650,000, you could buy a fully protected Audi, BMW or Mercedes.

I've seen the armoured Silver Spur as well. Only embassy cars are armoured by Rolls-Royce. They seem to max up at B6-level. Most armoured cars are B6/B7, but all the factory-armoured I've seen is B6 only.

The design of the Arnage divided is fantastic and I love the way the wood panels blend in with the ones on the doors but I don't know if I would feel comportable in that backseat. There's too little light coming into the backseat and I would simply feel like a coffin sitting there. I prefer a divider where the upper part can me lowered for open communication with the driver and the front passanger.