A Lamborghini that made headlines for being allegedly taken on a 600km "joyride" by a Taupo mechanic is now up for sale.
Aucklander Chris Mosley has listed his 2017 model Huracan Avio for $419,000 on Trade Me, describing it as "by far the best looking Lamborghini" in New Zealand.
"Thistwin turbo Avio isn't all for show and boasts an incredible amount of power to accompany its aggressive look," his listing stated.
"I have spent the last 6 months ensuring the car excels in every way."
"It is now running over 600kw at all 4 wheels and well over 1000hp at the crank."
He told the Herald the Lamborghini was an amazing buy because it was one of New Zealand's rarest cars that "sounds the best, it looks the best [and it's] the fastest".
The listing comes two weeks after media outlets reported the Taupo company that helped tune-up the Lamborghini by fitting a specially imported kit to it had entered into liquidation.
Power Torque owner Chris Timmerman blamed his company's collapse on the bad press he suffered after Mosley accused him last November of taking the car on an unofficial joyride when it was supposed to be getting serviced.
Mosley told the Herald at the time he assumed the company would run his luxury car on a dyno machine as part of the tuning process, as well as briefly running it on the road.
"But when I picked the car up from them it had another 600km on the speedo than it did when I dropped it off", he alleged.
While Timmerman denied any wrongdoing, Mosley claimed he also discovered his car had been driven at speeds of up to 170km/h and an aftermarket GPS system showed it had been driven to Rotorua and back twice.
"It looks like they took it for a joyride, obviously because they liked the car," he said.
Timmerman responded by saying he had hired a lawyer to demand Mosley pay $58,000 in unpaid bills as a result of Power Torque's work on the car and to threaten defamation action over Facebook posts.
This month, he told Stuff that Mosley's unpaid bills and defamatory comments on social media had caused Power Torque to lose more than $300,000 in other work as a result of the bad publicity.
"Whatever side of the dispute people choose to believe or empathise with or relate to – that really has nothing to do with the car," told the Herald today.
"The car is still quality."
A number of commenters on the Trade Me listing wished Mosley the best with the sale.
"Very nice car good luck with the sale", one wrote, while another said, "Siiiiiick car brother ... hope the new owner looks after it as well as you do".
Another said: "One of those articles painted u in a bad light but maybe you are a good dude. My bad."
When one commenter asked "Got a pic of dyno sheet showing 1000hp,", the owner of the Trade Me account wrote back saying: "I certainly do. I will trade you for a pic of your bank account showing you can afford it".
