SUV fit for an apocalypse
If you consider the Jeep Grand Cherokee Trackhawk a bit soft, then Rezvani has just the SUV for you, writes Damien O’Carroll.
Big high-performance luxury SUVs are improbably a thing these days, and while jamming a massive supercharged V8 into what was previously a family-friendly school runner is a lot of fun and all – where are all the military-grade options for surviving the impending apocalypse?
If you have ever asked that question, then you are probably quite mad, but you now also have an answer, thanks to an American car manufacturer you have almost certainly never heard of; Rezvani Motors.
Rezvani Motors makes exactly two models – the ferociously fast Beast supercar that smashes to 100kmh in 2.9 seconds (the madness of its acceleration is only matched by that of its bizarre doors) and the brilliantly startling Tank SUV that, quite frankly, looks like it should only exist in a video game (and actually does, albeit called the Canis Freecrawler in Grand Theft Auto Online).
Rezvani has just released the new
2020 version of the Tank and added an even-more-insane version – the Tank X – that answers all your Mad Max-style post-apocalyptic dreams.
Where the ‘‘standard’’ Tank is powered by a choice of a 213kW
2.0-litre turbo four, a 213kW 3.6-litre
V6 or a 373kW 6.4-litre V8, the Tank X dismisses all that soft, low-powered nonsense by packing the feral supercharged 6.2-litre Demon V8 (from the Dodge Challenger SRT Demon) tuned to produce a truly terrifying 745kW (or a nice round 1000 horsepower), just because it can.
And it doesn’t stop there, because the Tank X also comes with the option of FLIR thermal night vision
(US$5500) and a full Fox Racing suspension setup with a 6-inch lift kit (for the bargain price of
US$12,500) if you are truly serious about taming the irradiated wastelands of our inevitable future.
But the biggest giveaway that the Tank X is aimed at extremely wealthy and extraordinarily paranoid doomsday preppers is the EMP (electro-magnetic pulse) Shield option – a thoroughly reasonable
US$2500 – that protects its electrical systems in the event of an atomic blast. Yep, really.
Rezvani says that the system can withstand 40 EMP blasts, which suggests they are expecting one hell of a nuclear conflict.
And, of course, while a Tesla Model X P100D may well be faster (Rezvani hasn’t actually released a
0 to 100 time for the Tank X, so it mightn’t be, because that thing is powerful), the Tesla will be a useless egg-shaped lump of metal after just one decent EMP blast. Sad.
While all of this would almost certainly be considered overkill for the school run, we are guessing that someone who is willing to drop
US$349,000 (NZ$540,000) on a Tank X wouldn’t even hesitate to tick all the boxes, even if they don’t truly believe the apocalypse is imminent, because why not?
If the Tank X is a bit rich for your bank account, the standard Tank (with its embarrassing engines) is a comparative bargain at US$155,000
(NZ$240,000), while if you are properly paranoid, then you can get the armoured Tank Military Edition for US$295,000 (NZ$457,000).