Geneva 2010: Koenigsegg Agera

You've got to love Koenigsegg.  Hard to say, easy to admire. The company was founded in 1994, which means it's one of the newer kids on the block.  Their intent was to bring a Swedish take on the classic supercar to market, taking the fight to Ferrari and Lamborghini on their first swing.  When you consider that they delivered their first production car to a customer in 2002, the fact that they've taken the top-end supercar market by storm (almost buying the entire Saab franchise along the way) in just 8 years is pretty damn amazing.

Their cars have always produced fairly alarming numbers - those early CC8S models cranked out 655bhp from a supercharged 4.6L V8, and the latest CCXR made an insane 1,107bhp on E85 - and the performance was suitable scary.  The Top Gear boys found this one out the hard way, when the normally infallible Stig spun the crap out of an early CC8S on the TG test track.  Koenigsegg added a rear spoiler for additional downforce, affectionately known as the Top Gear Wing.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iClS0t42e0k

Anyway, out with the old and in with the new - Koenigsegg showed off their newest model at the Geneva show this week, called the Agera.  It's a further development of the old CC8, but with some significant changes on the outside and inside.  Most noticeable is the restyling (mainly of the front end) to give the car a more fluid, curvy appearance.  I have to say I'm a fan, but you don't have to pull my leg to get my approval of a Swedish hypercar.  The Agera (which, by the way, is the Swedish verb for "to act" and is a foreshortening of the Greek word for "ageless") gets fancy LED running lights up front, and hollow-center "donut" taillights in the rear through which engine bay heat is extracted.  Other nifty details include wheels designed to suck air away from the brakes for better cooling, and a unique interior lighting system that Koenigsegg calls "Ghost Light" - which uses hollow machined aluminum switches with "nanotubes" that transmit light through the center.  It sounds like sci-fi to me!

Not so science-fiction is the engine bay.  It still uses the bespoke 4.7L V8, but ditches the twin superchargers for a more efficient bi-turbo setup.  Power output is extraordinary - the Agera develops 910bhp at 7,250rpm, and maximum torque of 1100nM (that's 811lb-ft!) at 5100rpm, with more than 1000nM (738lb-ft) available between 2680rpm-6100rpm - this thing will have absolutely intense mid-range pull.

The brakes are, thankfully, equally impressive: carbon-ceramic cross-drilled and ventilated rotors at all four corners, a massive 392mm in front and 380mm at rear with adjustable ABS intervention for varying surface conditions.  You'll need those massive brakes for the crushing performance.  Koenigsegg says the Agera can sprint from 0-100km/h in 3.1 seconds, 0-200km/h in 13.7 seconds, and a top speed approaching 245mph.  That top-speed number is slightly down from the biofuelled CCXR, but it's also about 200bhp short of that monster.  Also of note: the Agera, which is only about 100bhp short of the Bugatti EB16.4 Veyron, weighs only 2,832 lbs- about half what VW's crown jewel crushes the scales at.  Swedish minimalism at it's finest, there.

The pre-production Agera will be making the rounds at auto shows, with production expected to begin last quarter of 2010.  If you've got a few million Euros sitting around and want to scare yourself half to death, I can hardly think of a better way to do it.