A quick stroll around Dubai's shopping areas reveals sports cars and SUVs are completely normal. This is a country where princes own objects made from real gold, including whole vehicles. The V8 is probably the standard engine, and when gasoline costs about half a euro per liter, getting 30 l/100km is no big deal.
Even the local police have a fleet of big-engined cars, expensive ones at that, such as the Lamborghini Aventador and Bentley Bentayga. Anywhere else in the world, having a V12 patrol car would be absurd, but not here.
Such is the stage for this unique multi-wheel machine that makes even the G63 6x6 look small and insignificant. It's called the Dhabiyan and is the baby his Highness Sheikh Hamad Bin Hamdan Al Nahyan. The man has a fleet of other insane machines, many oddities that you may have already seen, but nothing of this scope.
Even though the vehicle described as a "desert ship" has no equivalent or rival, we couldn't find a single article about it. At least that's our excuse for writing about something revealed at the end of 2017.
Hamad bought a US surplus vehicle, the Oshkosh M1075 military truck with the PLS (Palletized Load System). It's the type that carries forward command centers or other containers, but could just as easily be a ballistic a ballistic missile carrier.
All of the original bodywork was removed and replaced with individual bits. I know most of you will say it's bad taste, but coachbuilt multi-wheelers were once very cool. While the overall design somehow resembles a streamlined American locomotive, some of the chassis is recognizable. For example, the cabin is Jeep Wrangler front is "stolen" from a 1940s truck. What do you guys think, GMC or Dodge?
Dhabiyan measures 10.8 meters long, 3.2 meters tall and 2.5 meters wide. It weighs 24 tons and is powered by a 600 horsepower Caterpillar 15.2-liter 6-cylinder water-cooled diesel engine. It also has a turning circle the size of the moon, but there's plenty of space out in the desert.
Mihnea's favorite cars have already been built, the so-called modern classics from the '80s and '90s. He also loves local car culture from all over the world, so don't be surprised to see him getting excited about weird Japanese imports, low-rider VWs out of Germany, replicas from Russia or LS swaps down in Florida. Full profile
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