This Guy Converted His Bugatti to Rear-Wheel Drive to Make it More Fun

From Road & Track

The Bugatti Veyron is no longer the fastest car in the world. While it was once the production car with the quickest 0-60, the highest top speed, and the greatest horsepower and torque figures in the history of the automobile, all of those numbers have since been surpassed-including by the Veyron's own successor, the Bugatti Chiron.

Still, you'd think a hypercar with a minimum of 1001 horsepower would be pretty exciting, even if it's using technology that's more than a decade old. But familiarity, it seems, breeds curiosity-in the form of, "I wonder what would happen if we did this?"

That's how Houston Crosta of Las Vegas ended up with what we believe to be the world's only rear-wheel drive Bugatti Veyron. And yes, it absolutely murders tires.

Crosta, the founder of Vegas car rental company Royalty Exotic Cars, has owned his Veyron for just under a year. It's already sporting some significant modifications-including a full Mansory carbon fiber body kit and an exhaust system that Crosta says bumps the car up to around 1100 horsepower. But despite all this power, Crosta found the driving experience a little too sanitary.

"I know the Veyron is fast, but I have more fun in a McLaren 720S," Crosta told R&T by phone. So he and Royalty Exotic Car fleet manager Jesse Tang set out to give the Bugatti something it never had: Rear-wheel drive.

How do you go about performing a Veyron rear-drive conversion? "Basically, we walked in and did it," Crosta told R&T.

"There's no information on Bugatti online at all," Tang explained. "There's no information to look up. You put 'Bugatti' in a search, all you get is pictures. We pretty much walked in blind."

This wasn't Crosta and Tang's first time diving into a Veyron project and figuring it out as they went. A few weeks back, the duo posted a video on YouTube showing them DIY-ing an oil change on the Veyron-a service that costs upwards of $20,000 when performed by a Bugatti service center.

If you can't view the YouTube video above, click here.

"We had no idea how to take it apart," Crosta said. "I've never even seen one apart. I've been to the Bugatti service center, and they never let you back there. They're secretive about what they do."

Crosta and Tang approached the rear-drive conversion the same way: They threw the Veyron on the lift and started disassembling things. Crosta had previously converted an all-wheel drive Lamborghini to rear-drive by removing the front differential and half-shafts. Thankfully, when he and Tang started tearing apart the Veyron, they realized the same strategy would work here.

"The axles are designed a lot differently from any other [VW Group supercar] I've ever seen," Crosta said. "I told Jesse, let's just take them out and see what happens."

Watching them disassemble the Veyron's front-axle driveline, you can tell they're just winging it, figuring things out as they go. But despite the fact that the car cost over $1,000,000 when new, and dealership services can cost six figures, Crosta and Tang proceeded undaunted.

"If you're careful, you should be alright," Tang told R&T. "We tear apart Huracans, Ferraris, Audi R8s, Gallardos, GT-Rs. We work on all of the cars here, it's nothing new."

As you can see, the experiment worked:

If you can't view the YouTube video above, click here.

So how's it drive now that it's sending 1100 horsepower to the rear wheels? "Everything is better now," Crosta told R&T. "If you're a good driver, and you enjoy cars, you'd love it. It feels like a car with this much power should. I love all-wheel drive cars, but there's something about that raw, rear-drive feeling, balancing it on the road yourself. It's a real car guy's car."

And before you ask, the tires that Crosta destroyed with those rear-drive burnouts aren't the Veyron-specific Michelins that cost more than $40,000 a set-they're 355/25R21 Pirelli P Zeros, the factory tire used on the Lamborghini Aventador, mounted on wheels that Crosta had custom-built for his Veyron. And despite being some of the widest tires you can buy today, they're definitely overtaxed.

Crosta has more planned for his Bugatti-including a custom tune to see if this 2008 model can make the 1200 hp and 1200 lb-ft of the later Veyron Super Sport. After that, he wants to do a top-speed run at the Bonneville Salt Flats, to see if the rear-drive conversion unlocked any extra miles per hour at the top end. But until then, Crosta is happy enjoying the world's only rear-drive Veyron.

"It definitely wants to cut loose a lot," Crosta says. "I've put about 400 miles on it since the rear-drive conversion. I actually like driving it way more now."

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