Maybach 57 news - The maddest Maybach yet? - 2007

A couple of weeks ago, we asked you to come up with your own strange Maybachs.

You didn't disappoint - hell, some of them were downright disturbing - but it looks like tuner Brabus has trumped you all in Maybach-modding stakes.

This is the Mercedes specialists' take on the Maybach 57, a modified limo that Brabus claims to be the fastest ultra-luxury saloon in the world.

How fast? 205.2mph, since you ask, a record just set at the Nardo test track in Italy. That's the same place that the Brabus Rocket - a tuned-up version of the Merc CLS - clocked 227mph last year, and it's the same bi-turbo 6.3-litre V12 that powers the warp-speed Maybach.

It develops a massive 730bhp and, just as impressively, 811lb ft of torque. That figure has actually been limited from 974lb ft by the engine electronics... presumably to prevent the Brabus from ripping a big hole in the space-time continuum.  

In finest tuning fashion, the Maybach gets 21-inch alloys and has been lowered by 15mm, too. Don't assume that it's some stripped-out racer, though: Brabus has gone to work on luxurising the interior with a pair of 15-inch flatscreen tellies, an on-board computer with wireless keyboard and mouse, and - naturally - lambs' wool floor mats. 

All very nice, but where's the washing machine?