Welcome everyone, to the Dream Factory.
Yeah, Ferrari's got its famous branded archway at the factory in Maranello,
but Koenigsegg has some flags and a white door
in a place called Ängelholm, in Sweden.
But, behind that door they make the very fastest cars in the world.
Today is very special indeed.
We're gonna get a chance to go in there, see how those cars are made.
We're even gonna get a tour of a brand new car,
the replacement for the Agera, no less.
From the big boss, Christian von Koenigsegg.
I feel a little bit like a kid that's found a golden ticket today
and this is Willy Wonka's factory.
Finding the factory is easy.
Take the turn at the Saab Viggen jet, how cool is that?
Keep going past the surface-to-air missile
and keep your eyes peeled for an enormous green shed.
In fact, it's an aircraft hangar that used to belong to the Ghosts,
Sweden's oldest fighter plane squadron.
Hence Koenigsegg logo.
Admire the wonderful and extremely orange CCXR in reception, and you're there.
There you are.
Yes, so, apparently Koenigsegg doesn't trust me with my jeans
and my belt around the new car.
Because it's just about to go to Geneva,
so they've given us these rather fetching trousers to put on.
I think I might have been a bit optimistic with the waist size.
No, no, there we go, snug. What do you think?
This is the Jesko, Koenigsegg's all-new replacement for the Agera,
having the finishing touches applied before shipped off to the Geneva show.
In fact, by now it's been fully revealed,
so here's a couple of clean shots for your benefit.
Oh, look, guess who has showed up to give us a personal tour of the new car?
This is it, then. This is the new one?
Yes, yes, this is our new baby.
New baby and I love the fact that this has to be shipped off
-to the Geneva show tomorrow? -Tomorrow night.
And as far as I can tell it doesn't look finished.
I'm pretty, pretty confident.
Usually, it looks less finished than this when we go to the Geneva two days before,
If you're confident, I'm confident.
-We'll see you next week. -Exactly, yeah.
If there's a big hole on your stand where this car should be,
we'll know it didn't go so well.
I thought I'd start with the name.
So, the name of this new car is Jesko.
The working name for this project for the last three years,
has been rhino-rack.
It's like this Norse... Yeah, the end of the world.
Our sales director, Andreas Petri, who's a very good friend of my father,
he said, "We should honour your father".
I mean, he was very instrumental in helping me in the early years.
He's also an entrepreneur by heart and he saw it was a tough struggle for me,
so, he came on board for a couple of years and helped me figure things out.
and was very instrumental in that.
He doesn't know still, so, we're hoping that can stay intact.
So, is this gonna be Koenigsegg's 300 mile an hour car?
So, not this particular version.
This is what we call the Jesko and it's a track focused car,
with 880 kilos of down force,
which is massive I mean, for any hypercar mega car
and it will create too much drag for that kind of speed.
But there is a version of this car which we call the Jesko 300
or let's say Jesko Ambition 300,
where we have a slightly different wing package,
a slightly smaller front splitter,
different arrangement in the front bonnet so we actually can store your roof there.
-This kind of track focus car cannot. -Okay.
And that car, theoretically, according to our simulations
is capable of going faster than 300 miles per hour.
So, you've run the simulation.
Is that something that you're interested in pursuing in real life?
I know that there's an American gentleman called John Hennessey,
who's being very vocal about the fact that he's going after 300.
Well, good for him. You know, these things...
It took us a long time to do our last attempt.
You have to find a venue, you have to find...
Well, you have to use a car in this case was a customer car...
You have to find a driver who is willing to do it.
It's a lot of things that comes about.
You need a tyre manufacturer that supports your effort.
And it's very dangerous and scary.
Like, we really have to consider if it's worth it.
We had wildlife running around, birds sitting on the road...
Anything can happen at these speeds.
It's detrimental that we kind of station the camera halfway down the road
and after a couple of weeks going through the material,
well there's a big bird sitting on the road and it flew away.
Then 10 seconds later boom the car came. Whoa.
We set everything up for at least 310 miles per hour,
so there is a little bit of buffer for error as well.
Dare I ask how much?
Yeah, so they start at 2.8 million dollars plus tax,
and X works and then you can add things on top of that.
We put in a huge effort to make the best car we can
for the purpose it's intended for.
It costs an absolute fortune but it doesn't mean we make a fortune.
We're a profitable company, like any other normal company.
But not more.
It actually costs that much to make them, create them and obligate them.
So, what we've done compared to the RS is we have elongated the wheelbase,
by elongating the carbon fibre monocoque.
We made a little bit of room here, a little bit taller inside.
So the glass areas are a little bit bigger.
It's to be able to catch the short basketball players.
Underneath here we also have... Like we pioneered on the 1 to 1.
Active moving flaps.
On this one it's bigger than ever before.
You can see them if you lie down there. They're hydraulically operated.
When we want maximum downforce, they're up.
And as we gain speed and downforce increases more than we want to
we push them down and bleed off the downforce and reduce drag.
And we do that together with the right height control,
bump and rebound control and rear wing angle.
The break here you can see we have this big wing
operating also as an air break.
And it also bleeds off when you go faster.
Yeah, your classic top mounted wing, of course.
Yeah, so it's a very efficient way.
The underside is what creates downforce.
To have that clean makes it more efficient.
And this curve of the wing is actually to follow regulations
not sticking outside of the car.
But I understand you've made life hard for yourself and developed your own gearbox.
Correct. One of our engineers who has been working here for 23 years,
a really clever guy, he said, "Why don't we do this, this, this, this?"
That seems interesting. It was a bit, like, can it be that simple?
Then we started calculating and it seemed like this will actually work.
Then we just went all in a year ago and started developing this gearbox.
So, it's like a derailing system on a bike, more or less.
You have two or three gears in the front
and six, seven, eight or whatever in the rear.
Together they can combine 25, 28 gears, but there aren't 28 gear sets.
The onboard computer will calculate how many gears can I shift
without over revving and still having the rev range.
And it does that, like that.
So, given the new turbos, given the crankshaft and the firing order.
and the new cylinder heads and everything,
we achieved 1280 horsepower on 95 octane fuel,
from a 5 litre engine,
with super good response like...
From just your standard petrol forecourt?
Exactly or 91 octane in the US.
Then if you fill up a full tank of E85, you have 1600 horsepower.
Is there space for an all electric hype car like this in the future?
Yeah, potentially. I mean, if we take the Regera,
if we tear out the combustion engine,
it is 800 volt, series produced, 700 horsepower electric car.
We could just put more batteries in there
and then another motor to have 1200 horsepower.
And the rest would already work.
To do what the Regera can do,
if you made a full electric car with the range and power and so on,
it would be 600 kilos heavier according to our calculations.
But as soon as the BEV can flat-out beat a hybrid,
maybe we sacrifice a sound and we do a full BEV.
But we don't see that in the next couple of years,
or the foreseeable future even.
What's interesting, the tyre is actually 2 times heavier than the wheel.
Tyre manufacturers need to up their game.
They're slowing you down.
-How much for a set of these? -It's about $65,000.
-What! Are the carbon wheels optional? -They are. Yes.
That's the standard wheel, let's say the first version of it.
We're still tweaking it a little bit.
We're gonna to slightly carve out some more material from here
to optimize the weight even further.
But that's the basic look of the wheel.
Some would say that for $3 million, you should get the fancy wheels for free.
You can always try.
Okay, throw in a set of wheels for free and you've got yourself a deal.
You can always try.
Here's a little bit of a Brucey bonus that we weren't expecting today.
I suppose these sort of things happen
when you spend a day at the Koenigsegg Factory.
Basically, they needed to do a little bit of tuning work on one of the Regeras.
One of the 80 cars of their building.
They said, "Jack, do you want to jump in the passenger seat?
We're gonna head down the runway and blast about in a Regera".
Well, I wasn't about to say no.
This is Koenigsegg's hybrid, so 1500 horsepower,
700 horsepower electric, 1100 from the combustion engine
but they reach peak power at different points so 1500 total.
Very, very excited about this.
This is a 2, 2.5 million pound car and they're going to let me in it.
See in a bit
Well, that was quite an experience.
That is my first time in a Koenigsegg, actually
I don't think I'm going to forget it in a hurry.
Don't know if you saw but we pretty much did 0 to 300 kilometres an hour,
then hard on the brakes back to zero.
In not very much space at all. I was literally hanging out the seatbelt.
You expect this thing to go ludicrously fast
but you probably don't expect it to break quite like that.
What a thing! It's one way to wake yourself up in the morning, isn't it?
All right, so this, apparently, is where it all begins.
This is the carbon fibre workshop, if you like.
Koenigsegg builds 30 to 40 percent of the smaller carbon fibre parts themselves.
The rest are built in the company they own in Spain,
but this is where it all begins.
Here you've got the rolls of carbon fibre, this is the really pretty stuff.
You see it's got a really nice finish there.
That's the stuff you see on the outside of the car.
This slightly rougher, bit gnarlier, that's the stuff you don't see.
But it's the same structure, it's the same strength.
Basically, you go to that computer bring up the part you need,
fire up this machine, which will then cut out the shape you need
and number it from the carbon fibre roll.
Stay with me on this.
The part then comes over here, they go into one of these cupboards
and find something like this.
An aluminium mould and that's what they build the carbon fibre part around.
They layer it up over there.
There's a pattern, so the people making it can't really go wrong.
I'll show you what I mean here, they've got a nice little part.
so the bits where you don't need too much carbon fibre,
you don't need it to be that strong, it's relatively thin.
The bit here where you need all the structural strength,
you can see there's many, many more layers here.
it's a thing of beauty but this is high-end engineering.
That's one of the first carbon fibre wheels. they ever produced in 2010.
There's a shelf over here I want you to see.
It has some really cool parts on it.
More wheels. I'll show you.
I am a weakling and I can pick that one up with ease.
But perhaps even more extraordinary is these steering wheels.
All carbon fibre, absolutely beautiful and weighs about as much as air.
That is extraordinarily light, I wish you could feel that.
Look, as if by magic here's someone actually making a carbon fibre wheel.
So these are the parts that the machine cuts out.
There are 650 of these apparently.
About 50 hours of work goes into each wheel.
and when you talk about a handmade process this is handmade to the nth degree.
So skilled, so beautiful as well.
You get up close and can see the intricacy of the layers of the carbon fibre.
But you wonder why this stuff costs so much but it's so labour intensive.
Alright, so, this is where the carbon fibre parts come next.
They're bagged up here by these skilled gentlemen here,
Vacuum packed and then taken to be baked up here
in this enormous cylindrical oven.
I'm told about four to five hours, 120 degrees they go in here.
Ironically, that's the same amount of time it takes
to do a good slow roast leg of lamb.
Alright, now we're talking, Getting to the really big stuff.
This is a chassis effectively,
built up of three or four big main structural elements.
You got the floor pan down here.
You've got the fuel cell, so that is effectively these side pods.
It runs across the back, runs down the other side.
Super strong, strongest bit of the car, so it keeps the fuel low,
and keeps it nice and safe.
You got your roll bar here and this windscreen section.
And if you ever want a demonstration of just how strong carbon fibre is,
look how relatively delicate that looks.
But you don't have to worry about it, that is absolutely rock-solid.
In fact, this is the strongest chassis in the business.
65,000 Newton metres per degree torsional stiffness,
More than a Chiron, take that Bugatti.
It's starting to look like an actual car now, isn't it?
So, this is, I'm told, the bit where they pre fit the panels
around a wooden buck here.
So, it's the last chance to check that all the panels fit together properly.
That you haven't got panel gaps you could drive a bus through.
This one's not looking too bad actually.
And it's also because it's the only chance before the cars finished and painted
that the panels will be lined up,
it's a chance for the painters to mark out where the stripes are going to be.
So, you'll see a few grey lines up here and here.
You wouldn't want to be painting those stripes on individual panels
and then praying that they lined up.
No, you've got to do it now.
It's also a good opportunity to talk about the different types
of naked carbon you can have.
You'll see down here, this is true naked carbon.
It's essentially the epoxy resin layer sanded back till it's raw carbon.
Don't go too far or you'll ruin the whole part.
Then it's just polished up.
The other option is clear coat.
So this is just a raw panel here, but you could have a clear coat on here.
That is just a case of painting on the clear coat.
It's becoming more and more popular with customers,
but if you're a traditionalist,
you may want your car painted with actual paint
and that begins over here.
So, you'll see a full set of panels here, Regera panels,
that are all taped up and prepped for paint.
More grey stripes up there.
You'll see this guy's obviously got some sort of graphics going on their car.
And this is where it all happens.
A couple of prep bays and the final blue box over there.
That's where the parts are actually painted.
To paint an entire Koenigsegg, I'm told, takes 600 to 800 hours,
which is just absolutely mind-blowing.
But when you learn what the panels have to go through, it makes sense.
Prep takes ages before you've even started,
whether you're having naked carbon or painting it,
you have to clear coat it, sand that down, clear coat it again, sand that down,
clear coat it again, sand that down...
Then it's ready for the paint, so say you're having a metallic paint,
three coats of colour, three coats of metallic
and then three coats of clear coat on top of that.
Absolutely mind-blowing.
You wouldn't want to get it wrong, would you?
So, this area is where the cars come to get a good old spit and polish.
You'll see here the tub, the chassis.
Pretty much anything that's visible is going to get a good old polish up.
Some things that aren't visible get a polish as well.
We have a look here
So, these are the aluminium components.
You'll see this is how they come in, a little bit mottled.
Then they're polished up, then sent away for a surface coating.
Then they come back and they're polished up again.
You're not allowed to touch those on pain of death without a pair of gloves on.
Over here.
So, these guys are polishing up those smaller carbon components,
the smaller aluminium components.
So, the paint shop 600 to 800 hours, here, another 200 hours of polishing.
Come check this out. Look, it looks a little bit like London Underground map,
but actually this is how Koenigsegg builds the wiring looms that go into each car.
So, it's obviously it's mapped out on this bit of paper,
to make sure you don't miss a single wire.
The complication blows my mind a bit, but it's an incredible thing.
I'm told that if you have a CAD drawing of a Koenigsegg
and you take away the body panels and the engine transmission
and the interior and everything, you're left with just the wires.
You've got this incredible skeleton of the car left over.
That would be quite a thing to hang on your wall, wouldn't it?
I wonder what that does.
Ah, yes, now we get to the oily bits.
the v8 engine, the five litre V8 engine 90 degree,
producing over 1100 horsepower in the Regera RS and the Regera.
Unfortunately, no one's working on this one,
but we do have three engines they built earlier over here in the stands.
How do I know this is the Regera? Well, look at the back here.
This is the giveaway, isn't it?
Two electric motors with the direct drive unit in the middle.
This is what they call the Hydra-Coup.
It's the thing that blends the electric power
and the combustion power together
to give you that a smooth output.
Quite a complicated thing, isn't it?
Can't wait to find out how they put this in an actual car.
Okay and on to the actual production line now.
Off to the side you'll see these little bays over here,
that's where various components are assembled.
So, for example a rear clamshell over there that's having its wiring.
The various systems put in for the rear wing.
But this is the main event,
this is the chassis receiving its wires and hydraulics and cooling systems.
And you'll notice these high-voltage orange cables.
Probably don't want to touch those.
This is the first car in the world to have an 800 volt system.
The second? That'll be the Porsche Taycan.
As we move along the cars become progressively more built.
This one it's got an engine. Look there it is, nestled in there.
Barely believable that there's room for all those components.
Here are the electric motors at the back.
The direct drive system.
Moving along, yes this one has gained the high voltage inverters.
The cooling systems for the inverters adding layer upon layer of complication.
You start to see, these are the struts for the rear clamshell.
Hydraulic struts that can pop it open at the touch of a button,
Will see the tubs all nicely polished up now
and looking presentable for their new owners.
These are the struts of course, for those amazing electrically deployable doors.
Earlier when we had a little ride in the Regera,
I fell a little bit in love with that hinge, there I said it.
And here's one almost finished.
Almost finished, almost ready for its panels.
I'll give it the patented Top Gear once-over.
Yeah, that's good to go, boys.
Okay, so here we are, here we are.
The final station, the finished product.
You may recognise this car,
it's the one we were riding around in on the runway this morning
and it has made its way back into the factory.
You may also have noticed that we skipped a few steps in the process.
That's because the bit in the production line,
the end of the line where the panels are put on and the interior is inserted,
and the finishing touches are applied is over there.
It contains two or three customer cars
and the customers don't want us to see before they see their own car.
Fair enough, we've got to respect their wishes.
But anyway, this is where it ends up.
There's a few interesting things to look at in here actually.
The first is this tape all over it
just to ensure the test drivers and me
don't add scratches to the chassis and the paint.
Covers on the seats, bubble wrap on the steering wheel like that.
And this film here that looks a little bit unattractive,
but that's just to protect the car while it's being run in,
so it doesn't get handed over to the customer covered in stone chips.
So, there you go, that is how a hyper car is made.
And believe me, I was as sceptical as you are
that any car on the world could be worth 2 to 3 million quid,
but you come here, when you see the skill, the craftsmanship
and the love that goes into all the components that make this car,
well, then you start to believe.