In Greek mythology, the Chimera was a fire-breathing monster with a lion’s head and neck, a goat’s body and a snake-like tail – and figuratively speaking, chimera means an unrealisable idea. But for Swedish hypercar manufacturer Koenigsegg nothing seems impossible – especially when Mohammed bin Sulayem approaches them with a request. For the president of the International Automobile Federation FIA, a one-of-a-kind “Chimera” was built in Ängelholm: the Koenigsegg Chimera super sports car, which combined three models: Agera RS, Jesko and CC850.
The Dubai native is clearly not a poor man, otherwise he would hardly have been able to afford to compete in classic rallies for several seasons, as well as a collection of rare supercars. And one of the latest acquisitions of the UAE figure was a unique car from Christian von Koenigsegg. It is noteworthy that bin Sulayem did not turn to Ferrari, Mercedes-AMG or Aston Martin in search of an exclusive car, but turned his attention to the Swedish company, of which he is a client.
Koenigsegg Chimera
Photo by: Königsegg
In 2015, the Agera RS hypercar debuted, which became a lighter and more powerful modification of the Agera model, launched on the occasion of the 15th anniversary of Koenigsegg. The car received a 940-horsepower 5.0-liter V8 turbo gasoline engine, which allowed the coupe to accelerate from 0 to 100 km/h in just 3.1 seconds and reach a top speed of 440 km/h. The RS version has already acquired a version of the engine with a capacity of 1160 horsepower, which is capable of developing even 1 MW of power on E85 fuel – 1341 hp. – which made the model the world’s first megacar.
Four years later, in 2019, the premiere of the Jesko took place – the successor to the Agera, named after Jesko von Koenigsegg, the father of the company’s founder. The car received a 5.1-liter turbocharged V8, which, despite the similarity to the power unit of its predecessor, was actually designed anew – the engine implemented many innovative solutions invented by the Swedish brand specifically for the Koenigsegg Jesko, which made it possible to obtain 1280 hp. power on regular fuel and 1600 hp simultaneously. on bioethanol.
Koenigsegg Chimera
Photo by: Königsegg
One of the most unusual technical features of the model was the Light Speed Transmission (LST) gearbox – a nine-speed robotic transmission with eight (!) clutches and the Ultimate Power on Demand (UPOD) function, which allows you to almost instantly shift not only one gear up or down, but also skip several steps at once for the most efficient acceleration. Jesko received a Triplex suspension with a third horizontal shock absorber on the front and rear axles, which helps combat parasitic body movements during acceleration and braking, as well as a fully controlled active rear steering chassis system.
Naturally, like all of Ängelholm’s cars, the hypercar is built around a carbon monocoque, has a full carbon fiber body with an aggressive design and carefully thought-out aerodynamics, which in the case of the Absolut version can potentially help the car accelerate to 560 kilometers per hour! But this was not enough for the Swedes, so in 2022 the CC850 was shown – the newest hypercar dedicated to the 20th anniversary of the brand’s first production model, the Koenigsegg CC8S.
Koenigsegg Chimera
Photo by: Königsegg
The novelty was equipped with a Jesko engine, but in a 1385-horsepower version on E85 fuel (1135 hp on regular gasoline), which, with a weight of 1385 kg, provided the model with a power-to-weight ratio of 1:1, but the main feature of the hypercar was the innovative gearbox. The light-speed transmission was supplemented by the Engage Shift system (ESS), which made it possible to add a “robot” manual mode – a clutch pedal and a transmission selector with a search gear selection mechanism appeared.
Koenigsegg Chimera
Photo by: Königsegg
In fact, the lever acts on the third pedal, which, in turn, sends signals to turn on the stage selected by the driver to the electronic unit, which does all the work. Christian von Koenigsegg is proud of his engineers who implemented such a difficult project: there are even different gear ratio options for driving around the city and racing on the track, and for maximum imitation of “mechanics”, the transmission even has the ability to stop the engine by releasing the clutch pedal too sharply!
Koenigsegg Chimera
Photo by: Königsegg
The innovative hypercar was produced in an edition of 50 units as a gift to mark the half-century of the brand’s founder. Among the buyers of the model was Mohammed bin Sulayem. The Arab’s car collection is valued at over $75 million and includes a Ferrari LaFerrari, a Bugatti Chiron Super Sport, a Mercedes-Benz CLK GTR Strassenversion, an Aston Martin Valkyrie, a McLaren Senna, a Pagani Huayra BC, a Porsche 911 GT2 Strassenversion and two McLaren Speedtails, but it seems that the Koenigsegg Chimera will be the rarest in the collection. But it is not the only model of the Swedish brand: the FIA president also ordered a Jesko and a CC850, so the company considers him one of the most devoted fans of the brand. Which gave the company the opportunity to build an incomparable car.
Koenigsegg Chimera
Photo by: Königsegg
It turned out that bin Sulayem literally fell in love with the technical innovations of two new Koenigsegg products, so he turned to Christian von Koenigsegg with a request to turn his Agera RS into a one-of-a-kind hypercar: a Koenigsegg Jesko power unit was integrated into the body of the Koenigsegg Agera RS, with which the gearbox from the Koenigsegg CC850 was coupled! The head of the Swedish company could not refuse his regular customer, so he gladly agreed to an unusual order.
From the outside it might seem like there are no problems in combining units, even though they are from three different models, but from the same brand, but in reality the construction of the machine took three years. The original Chimera hypercars belong to different generations, which required moving the battery, creating new mounts for the transmission, preparing new wiring harnesses, developing new software that could make friends with each other with elements that were not designed to interact with each other, even the multimedia system had to be redone. But this was not enough for bin Sulayem, so he set Koenigsegg another challenge, asking him to add paddle shifters to his car, like in the Jesko Absolut and Jesko Attack, so that in the Chimera there were three ways to change gears at once.
Interior of the Koenigsegg Chimera
Photo by: Königsegg
The suspension had to be reworked by combining elements from Jesko and Regera, as well as creating a new transmission cooling system, taking into account the undesigned arrangement of the units and a combination of components completely unforeseen by the engineers. According to Christian von Koenigsegg, it was easier and cheaper to develop a new car from scratch than to mix and operate new and old technologies in a single car.
Overall, the Koenigsegg Chimera is ready, but minor improvements are still being made: Mohammed bin Sulayem has not yet received his unique hypercar in every respect, but Top Gear journalists had the opportunity to personally meet the exclusive coupe of the founder of the Swedish brand.
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