JON SIMMS, ROLLS-ROYCE GHOST ENGINEERING LEAD
You’re calling this the most high-tech Rolls-royce; is it more advanced than the Phantom?
“Yes it is, by virtue of the permanent four-wheel drive and four-wheel steering, and because we’ve made various iterative changes to systems like navigation and suspension.”
There’s now a close relationship between the new Ghost and Phantom suspension hardware, right?
“Yes, indeed. That’s the whole point of building cars on our shared architecture. It doesn’t mean they have to be the same size or proportions, but it brings many new benefits to Ghost it couldn’t have had before.”
What does your Flagbearer stereo camera see when it looks down the road?
“It doesn’t actually see every bump or pothole; it works to assist our other Planar suspension measures. It’s our way of going the extra mile. In reality, it sees shadows and highlights and can forewarn the system of big road disturbances in time for a change of suspension settings.”
Given all of your noise, vibration and harshness measures, is the Ghost now quieter than the Phantom?
“No, neither in objective nor subjective terms, although they’re now pretty close. In Phantom, you get the benefit of a bit less engine and gearbox noise because you’re sitting farther away from them. Phantom also has a thicker D-pillar and larger cavities in the body for noise-cancelling materials. We checked them regularly, to see how we were faring with Ghost. Mind you, compared with any other car made, both of them are extremely quiet cars.”
Does anyone else use your ‘whisper’ idea for tuning the car’s vibration frequencies? Is this a BMW theory?
“No, we’ve not heard of it from BMW and we’re not aware of anyone else doing it that way. We think it’s one important benefit of having a very small acoustics group; larger teams have specialists in different acoustic areas whose work then has to be integrated. But we all pull in the same direction, and it works.”
Flagbearer sees shadows and highlights and can forewarn the system of big disturbances