An All-Electric Rolls-Royce Phantom V by Lunaz

An All-Electric Rolls-Royce Phantom V

You don’t drive a Phantom V so much as you enter it, like a private lounge that happens to have license plates. The James Young–bodied 1961 Rolls-Royce before us stretches like a boulevard. Close the coach doors, draw the privacy screen, sink into the immaculate rear bench, and the city recedes to a tasteful blur. There’s only the faintest thrum of tires and the soft choreography of air and light. Then it moves silently, and you realize the party trick: this Phantom is all-electric. This car is Lunaz at full stride. From its Silverstone, UK, base, within earshot of Britain’s temple of speed, the company doesn’t merely “convert” classics; it remasters them. The donor arrives tired, often hiding corrosion under shiny paint. The car leaves after an 18–24-month, nut-and-bolt restoration with modern electrical architecture, a proprietary dual-pack traction battery, and a powertrain calibrated not for drag-strip theatrics but for Rolls-Royce hush. The point isn’t to erase the Phantom’s character; it’s to preserve and elevate it for the twenty-first century.

The Brief: Keep the Phantom a Phantom

A chauffeur car must waft. That’s rule one. In the back of Lunaz’s 1961 Phantom V, you feel the brand’s restraint and taste: the car rises with unflustered intent, gathers pace with a single long gear, and trims speed on regenerative braking that hands off to friction so cleanly you don’t spill your champagne. Torque is generous, well north of the original 6.2-liter V8, but never uncouth. This is power you glide on, not brag about.

Suspension is part of the magic. Rolls-Royce pioneered adaptive philosophies decades ago to keep passengers floating while giving chauffeurs a touch more control when needed. Lunaz preserves that ethos and adds modern control layers: a softer setting turns the Phantom to velvet, and a firmer one keeps it poised and eerily flat for something the size of a small conservatory. Cornering isn’t drama; it’s manners. The electric drivetrain removes the old four-speed slushbox’s indecision and the V8’s heat and rumble, leaving a serenity that suits central London every bit as well as a hotel porte-cochère in Miami.

Design Studio to Battery Bay

Lunaz starts where Rolls-Royce always started: with taste. Every build begins in a design studio that treats the car like a commission, not a configurator. Clients explore bespoke palettes sprayed onto sculpted “speed-forms,” choose veneers (often retaining original wood with new satin lacquer for a tactile, period-correct feel), and curate materials from traditional hides to progressive bio-textiles. Hidden modernities are integrated with deference:Apple CarPlay and navigation live discreetly; the audio system is thoroughly modern but visually invisible; heated seats, upgraded HVAC, and subtle convenience tech are blended so the cabin reads authentic at a glance.

Under the skin, the process is exhaustive. The Phantom’s body is stripped to bare metal; sills and wings are cut and replaced where time has taken its toll; chrome is re-plated to jewelry standards; wiring is entirely new. Critically, the original chassis architecture is respected. Where possible, Lunaz engineers mount motors to bespoke subframes that pick up factory mounting points, preserving structure and crucially keeping the transformation theoretically reversible.

Battery technology is the company’s quiet flex. Packs are designed and hand-built in-house on rotisseries, using proven tier-one cells arranged into front and rear traction batteries. A typical energy content for Lunaz’s large platforms sits around 80 to 85 kWh, with 22 kW AC and 50 kW CCS DC charging available, exactly the right balance when range is less mission-critical than weight distribution and drivability in a chauffeur-led city life. Software is proprietary, and drive mapping is tailored to use case: more low-speed finesse for hotel fleets and more midrange response for owner-drivers who sneak the keys for a Sunday glide.

Why Electric Suits a Rolls-Royce

Back in the lounge, the story lands not in numbers but in experience. The privacy screen whispers upward. Conversations arrive in soft focus. You sense the road only as a suggestion. Then the chauffeur demonstrates the other side of silence: the Phantom gathers itself and surges on a wave of torque that makes urban gaps effortless and freeway merges unceremonious. No kickdowns, no gearshifts, no vibration. Just an extraordinarily dignified kind of speed. Regenerative braking is the other half of refinement. Done badly, regen makes passengers seasick. Here the hand-off is better than what many modern OEMs manage: the car trims velocity like a seasoned driver feathering a brake pedal.

Charles Rolls once praised the electric motor’s quietness; Henry Royce was a compulsive improver. In that light, Lunaz isn’t heresy; it’s a plausible alternate history. Rolls-Royce spent a century muting internal combustion; electrification finishes the job. There’s no smell, no heat soak, no starter whirr, and an elegance to the way the Phantom V now moves that feels truer to the spirit of luxury than any V8 burble ever did.

The Business of Bespoke

Lunaz limits itself to five British platforms—Rolls-Royce, Bentley, Jaguar, Aston Martin, and Range Rover—preferring depth over breadth. Production is intentionally low volume (roughly 12–16 cars a year), with builds now past the 50-car mark. Lead times run 18–24 months once a donor is sourced and assessed. The clientele spans major collectors (for whom this becomes the car that unexpectedly turns “daily”) to luxury buyers who never previously touched classics, all drawn by the promise of zero-anxiety usability and museum-grade craft.

Pricing reflects the scope. The Phantom sits at the top of Lunaz’s signature range, with an indicative starting price around £800,000 for the remaster (donor and bespoke extras separate). That’s a $1.0–$1.2M project overall, depending on coachwork rarity and personalization. These are assets: one-of-one commissions with brand-backed provenance and a use case that includes zero-emissions city duty for hotel fleets. (A concierge program with top-tier hotels is already in motion; imagine the front desk offering a Phantom V for airport runs.)

Craft + Race-Grade Engineering

Silverstone isn’t just a romantic address. It feeds Lunaz’s talent pipeline: a mix of race-team electrical minds and old-world coach craft. Trim rooms reimagine interiors down to custom armrests with hidden bars and cigar accoutrements; paint booths mix proprietary hues; electrical rooms loom each car with a standardized spine and bespoke overlays for options. The result is not a retrofitted car; it is truly an OEM-grade integration with a coachbuilt soul.

1961 Rolls-Royce Phantom V by Lunaz (James Young)

Powertrain: Lunaz proprietary single-speed electric drive, bespoke subframe mounts to original chassis
Battery System: Dual traction packs, ~80–85 kWh combined; front + rear placement for weight balance. Lithium-ion pouch cells in twin 2s2p configuration, 1250 Wh/3.80 V each.
Charging: 22 kW AC (three-phase), 50 kW CCS DC fast charge
Chassis & Suspension: Original chassis restored and retained
Interior: Full Concours-level retrim; original wood sets re-veneered with satin lacquer; hidden infotainment (with Apple CarPlay), upgraded audio, heated seats, discreet nav, upgraded HVAC, privacy division
Build Time: 18–24 months (post-donor assessment)
Information: ByLunaz.com