This is the world's most powerful street-legal all-wheel drive estate. At least, Brabus claims this is the world's most powerful street-legal all-wheel drive estate, and frankly we're not going to argue.

Meet the 850hp Brabus 850 6.0 Biturbo, 850hp worth of Mercedes E63 AMG - a car very few have described as 'underpowered' - and possibly the quickest way to become very friendly with your local tyre depot. And police station. And divorce lawyer.

So what are we looking at? The mighty Merc's 'standard' 5.5-litre twin turbo V8 has been bored out to 5.9-litres, and gets forged pistons, a precision-balanced billet custom crankshaft and eight custom billet piston rods, together with flowed cylinder heads.

The turbos have been replaced with Brabus items, featuring larger compressors and special exhaust manifolds, while there's a carbonfibre intake module, integrated air duct in the bonnet, and intake and charge-air tubes with special gold heat reflection sheathing.

And you get a stainless steel sports exhaust with a control valve that alters the noise: you can choose a 'coming home' mode, where it whispers, or a 'sport' mode, where it causes your dog to have a seizure.

All of this tweaking, together with a remapped ECU, naturally, causes 850hp to be made (the most powerful Brabus engine to date) and a potential 1,450Nm of torque, though output is capped at 1,150Nm in the 'interest of the longevity of the powertain'.

0-100km/h takes just 3.1secs, and it'll top out at 350km/h. We don't need to tell you how many supercars this thing can waste.

There are some aero tweaks too: a front spoiler lip, diffuser, monoblock alloy wheels, a custom Brabus interior and even some race pedals.

If this isn't mad enough, then perhaps sir would prefer the Brabus 700 Widestar instead, also at Essen? It's a 700hp G63 AMG, built for the Dubai police department.

STORY Vijay Pattni