Rolls Royce SUV has eye on aluminium chassis

Forever looking at ways to improve the ride quality of its cars, Rolls Royce is close to rolling out a new aluminium space frame which will eventually underpin its entire range.

This week Rolls Royce announced that this bespoke chassis architecture will be ready for mainstream premiere in 2018 but at this point nobody knows whether the highly secretive SUV (codenamed Cullinan) or the next generation Phantom will receive it first.

Test mules of the SUV, which will eventually rival Bentley’s Bentayga, are already clocking up mileage on public roads but we’ll only get an accurate picture of what to expect when the prototypes are put into action sometime this year. The next generation Phantom is at a similar stage.

Rolls Royce says the tests are to ensure the architecture delivers the brand’s trademark ‘magic-carpet ride’  regardless of the terrain – which if you read between the lines is a statement of very SUV-ish nature.

“I am announcing today that on-road testing of our all-new proprietary architecture is beginning,” Rolls-Royce CEO Torsten Müller-Ötvös said in a statement. “This new architecture of pure luxury represents considerable investment in the future of our great brand.”