A supercar known as the Vector W8, the first in a batch of only 17 examples produced in the United States in 1990, has cropped up at an auction this weekend. It has been bid to $500,000 with a few days remaining on the clock.
From the technical standpoint, the Vector W8 is a production version of the W2 Concept that the company unveiled in the distant year 1967. It was designed with a tapering body shape characteristic of European supercars of that era and largely consisted of composite and aluminum panels.
A six-liter turbocharged engine leveraged the racing technology of the time to hit the wheels with 625 PS (616 hp / 460 kW) and 881 Nm (650 lb-ft) of torque. Rumor has it that simply increasing the boost pressure was enough to almost double the output to 1,200 PS (1,184 hp / 883 kW). The manufacturer specified a 0-96.6 km/h (0-60 mph) sprint time of 3.9 seconds and a top speed of 390 km/h (242 mph).
The example on sale proudly bears the chassis number 001 and was originally purchased by a member of the Saudi Arabia Royal Family. The owner exhibited it at the 1990 New York International Auto Show and only parted with the car in 1999.
Once sold, the Vector W8 had stayed with one owner for the next quarter of the century. It somehow ended up with a broken digital dashboard and a damaged odometer, making it impossible to tell the exact mileage, but the seller says the winning bidder will be getting all the necessary replacement parts.
Even if don’t count this mysterious damage, the car is otherwise no longer stock. Among other things, it rides on 17-inch aftermarket wheels styled to look like the OEM 16-inch rims.
