They did initially yes, it's an engineering masterpiece that cost millions to develop, much like a Formula 1 car, or Rally car. A friend of mine Elfyn, is about 5th in the World Rally, he has a fiesta with a 1.6 litre 300 hp engine which cost about £500,000. Only designed to last a season, there's not much profit there either!

You buddy Elfyn should post his race mileage on Fuelly.com. His fuel savings will help pay for his new engine. I'm smart, eh? And, I wasn't even tryin'! :)

I had a Citroën Xantia Hdi estate (as a pizza delivery car, complete with stick on flames!) and thanks to the Hydropneumatic suspension, I used to boast to people "she makes love to the roundabouts!". It had about 110 bhp, returned about 35 to the gallon working. Another old '92 Astra 1.7 turbo diesel estate (Isuzu engine) was a treat to throw around country lanes and city streets delivering. These weren't particularly powerful cars but they (at least seemed to!) handled well. I d never want a Veyron. If I had more money than sense, then possibly a Mazerati Quatreporte (if diesel) but a 1St gen Honda Insight would be my first lottery purchase. If I was ever to own something as inefficient, expensive to run and in need of transport to locations, I d at least want a WW2 tank of halftrack!

Ben there are plenty of MK1 insights on EBay, it's one of my saved searches, they are pretty rare, but there are lots of Japanese imports coming over now as they sold more over there. Some have auto boxes so watch out. They demand more money, but a UK example will be more "used" than an import. As for the Masserati, both the Quattroporte and the smaller Ghibli have excellent diesel engines available, keep saving! ;)

Ha ha! Will be a LONG time from now - just bought my first house, no toys, projects or spare cars for me unless I win the lottery! A mk 1 insight went unsold on eBay for less than £2,500 a whole back, about half what I d seen before, but I m in no position to get one.

I would take the Veyron money and buy an Ariel Atom and a lot of cool other stuff like a Lotus Elan, Austin Healey Mk III, Norton Commando and several similar cool things and have a lot of money left over.

As some of you know, I hypermile my BMW 640i Gran Coupe. Although it is far from a supercar, people find it weird that I would hypermile an expensive car. They don't understand the satisfaction of conserving fuel and emissions while also avoiding fuelling stops so that a tank seems to stretch forever.

But a Bugatti is all about the engine. It would not make sense to me when the situation is taken to this extreme.

Just an afterthought, I wonder if the W16 VW engine in the Bugatti Veyron is subject to the emissions scandal? ;)

As an unrelated matter, were a US citizen to be given (or win in a lottery) a Veyron, the US Internal Revenue "Service" would consider it to be income. It would be taxed as income for the year in which it was given, at the sticker price. Mighty few could afford to pay the taxes on it.

OUCH!

While we're poking holes in fantasies... Remember this. For example, when you pay $20k cash for a car, you're really paying $30k. That's because, if you typically lose 30% of your gross paycheck to federal/state taxes, you have to EARN $30k in order to have $20k leftover to pay for the car.