Photo: Mr. Trinh Van Quyet's Phantom car - a one-time masterpiece worth more than 24 billion VND

The unique super luxury car is one of 6 cars in the Dong Son Bronze Drum collection for the Vietnamese market.

Phantom Sacred Fire is a super luxury sedan made by Mr. Trinh Van Quyet (FLC), imported into Vietnam in 2015 as an official product. In the Dong Son Bronze Drum collection conceived by the Rolls-Royce distributor in Vietnam, only Sacred Fire was produced, the other five versions were not produced due to lack of customers.

The collection includes Sacred Fire, Wave, God of Mountain, The Money Rain, Alluvium and Au Co Mother.

Sacred Fire represents Fire in the Five Elements, representing development according to the concept of successful businessmen. Therefore, the car has Madeira red on the bottom and Sunrise rose gold on the top representing prosperity. The front of the car is impressive with the gold-plated Spirit of Ecstasy logo, shiny chrome Pantheon grille, LED headlights with separate turn signals.

As the EWB Series II version, the car is up to 6,092 mm long, 1,990 mm wide, 1,640 mm high and has a wheelbase of 3,820 mm.

When launched in 2015, Phantom Sacred Fire was made according to customer's wishes and cost more than 51 billion VND. After 8 years of ownership by Mr. Trinh Van Quyet, the car was auctioned in November 2022 with a starting price of 28 billion VND. After 7 times, the price was reduced to 16.5 billion VND and it has an owner. Currently, the car is bought back by a private showroom and offered for sale at a price of more than 24 billion VND.

Running along the body of the car is a hand-painted yellow coachline by artist Mark Court, and the bronze drum symbol appears on the car's ears. From the idea requested by a customer in Hanoi to the execution by the artisans at Goodwood, the Phantom Sacred Fire took nearly 10 months to design and create.

Specifically, the details on the car such as the sun, cranes, and dancing people are drawn according to the traditional Vietnamese bronze drum lines, which are very sophisticated and took a long time to make. The dealer in Vietnam came up with the idea, but all the lines were drawn by the artist at Goodwood.

The rear of the car retains the imposing appearance of the top luxury car line from Rolls-Royce. The exhaust pipe, door trim, taillight trim and trunk are chrome-plated to create a luxurious highlight. The fuel tank cap is placed high up near the D-pillar. The rear doors are designed to open backwards (suicide doors) which Rolls-Royce calls “Coach Doors”.

The cockpit is a blend of leather and wood in a golden brown tone. The 3-spoke steering wheel is large and has a small cross-section. Behind the steering wheel is the gear lever and a mechanical dashboard combined with a multi-information LCD screen. The entertainment screen flips when the car is started.

The passenger seat cover has Dong Son motifs. After 8 years of driving with more than 87,000 km, the cockpit is still new, the wood surface paint is still shiny, the leather seat has signs of wrinkles over time but not significant.

The car door is made thick with many layers of soundproofing, only has the door handle and the window up/down button. So the seat adjustment buttons are hidden under the compartment between the two seats, multi-directional adjustment, seat memory, left and right movement and 3 buttons to open and close the rear compartment curtains.

Each chrome sill is engraved with the Sacred Fire edition name and is handcrafted in Goodwood, England. However, after 8 years, the sills are quite scratched.

The rear doors are equipped with curtains and umbrellas hidden in the door slots. The dashboard is painted with a picture of a Lac bird, with a total of 18 Lac birds (9 on each side) symbolizing the 18 Hung Kings. The floor is lined with felt and fur for a soft feeling. The bronze drum symbol with the sun in the center is embroidered on the headrests of the 4 seats. The special feature is the Lac bird image on the bronze planting pattern rotating clockwise instead of counterclockwise like the original Dong Son bronze drum. The star ceiling is made of fiber optic lights with thousands of LED bulbs.

In front of the boss's seat is a privacy partition made of leather, wood and transparent soundproof plastic on top. Compared to car models with glass partitions that can be opened/closed or blurred, the plastic partition will be fixed and can only talk to the driver through the microphone available on the car. In addition, the car is also equipped with two work tables with integrated entertainment screens.

Between the two seats are two separate refrigerators, with temperatures of 6 and 11 degrees Celsius respectively, for preserving wine. Between the two compartments are cup holders and crystal decanters.

Phantom Sacred Fire uses a 6.75 liter V12 engine, 454 horsepower and 720 Nm of torque. Combined with an 8-speed ZF gearbox, the car can accelerate from 0-100 km/h in 5.2 seconds.