Creation
Body
The Phantom Drophead Coupé is built around a version of the innovative hand-welded aluminium spaceframe first seen in the Phantom.
Some 250mm shorter than that of the original, the Drophead Coupé’s spaceframe is built from 200+ extruded aluminium profiles, 40 per cent of which are new. Together with around 300 parts made from aluminium sheet, the structure is welded together by highly skilled craftsmen in a painstaking process requiring some 500 feet of weld in 2000 separate locations. More welding takes place at the point where the superformed aluminium front wings are joined to the sill, but thanks to the extraordinary skill of our craftsmen, the join is seamless, and invisible once the body is painted.
To ensure the Drophead Coupé’s structure has standard-setting levels of rigidity and safety, the spaceframe features a brace bar across the engine bay, and four more beneath the floor at the front and rear of the chassis. The sill profiles are deeper and thicker for additional strength.
Perhaps the most impressive new feature of the spaceframe is the A-pillar and windscreen surround, which is triangulated for optimum strength and roll-over protection. In fact, so effective is this A-pillar design that roll-over protection in the Drophead Coupé is as good as that of the Phantom.
