All Entries in the "BENTLEY" Category
2011 Bentley Continental GT: Evolution Not Revolution
by Gunnar Heinrich ::: img Bentley Motors + Autoblog ::: 2011 Bentley Continental GT Début
WATCHING the teaser on Bentley’s posh new reveal site – ContinentalGT.com – and finding no tasty clues what-so-ever (c’mon a fender? a signal? anything?) I headed over to Autoblog which has already posted shots of the 2011 Bentley Continental GT. The industrious John Neff at work, no doubt.
If what we see is the reality that will present itself next model year, Bentley’s taken a relatively cautious, evolutionary step with its bread and butter coupe.
The most important changes to what’s billed as an all-new Continental GT – are headlights and front airdam that echo the Mulsanne saloon. The GT’s front fenders, too, have been softened to give the profile a better sense of length and less heft.
Is it prettier than the first Continental GT, released all the way back in 2003? Not so sure. More on this next week when the Continental’s officially unveiled on September 7th.
More Reason To Love Jennifer Love Hewitt
by Gunnar Heinrich ::: img via Zimbio ::: Jennifer Love Hewitt + Bentley Continental GTC
YOU can now add impeccable taste in motor cars to the list.
Above pictured is Jennifer Love Hewitt, lovely star of small and large screen, entering the driver’s side of a pearlescent white Bentley Continental GTC.
Seasoned veterans readers will note that celeb sitings are not generally done here -but- for the sunny Ms. Hewitt and her fine Bentley an exception’s due.
An endorsement deal in the making?
Seen: Bentley S2 Continental Drophead Coupe
by Gunnar Heinrich ::: img ADLX ::: Bentley S2 Continental Drophead Coupe by H.J. Mulliner
MERCY. Few cars carry themselves as beautifully and as stoically as Rolls-Royces and Bentleys of the late 50s/early 60s.
All that chrome. The tall/wide/long proportions that billow over the frame. Crewe chariots of this genre are a proud mix of pre and post war engineering. And this early 60s Bentley S2 Continental Drophead Coupe (DHC) is by no means an exception.
We have H.J. Mulliner to thank for this S2 Continental DHC’s fluid fenders and classic, Royce-inspired fascia. The blood-red leather inside absolutely pops against the grey exterior – a strikingly handsome combination absent in today’s automotive color palettes.
The classic 6230 cc V8 mated with 4-Speed autobox – as found in Silver Clouds – managed to move the 4500+ pound convertible with what one might describe in RR-era vague terminology- “deliberate efficacy.”
That this majestic Bentley is one of fewer than four hundred S2 Continentals ever made makes this sighting very special indeed.
Dirk Van Braeckel Walks Us Through The Bentley Mulsanne’s Design
by Gunnar Heinrich ::: YouTube ::: 2011 Bentley Mulsanne
IN The flesh, the 2011 Bentley Mulsanne (pronounced “Mul-SAHN”) is rather imposing. In some respects those “power lines” effect a paradoxically subtle grace. But in photographs, these aspects don’t always filter through; leaving the new flagship took look bloated.
Nevertheless, whether you love or loathe the new Mulsanne’s basking shark face mixed with coupe-ified Rolls-Royce DNA, you’ll likely appreciate understanding how the Bentley design team got there.
Dirk Van Braeckel, Bentley’s design chief gives us a brief, guided glimpse of the styling elements that grace the latest Bentley to wear the Mulsanne tag.
On Main Street: Bentley Azure Convertible
by Gunnar Heinrich ::: img ADLX ::: 2010 Bentley Azure Convertible in Chester
CHESTER, Conn. is a wonderfully dynamic town. Perched over a small tributary to the Connecticut River, Chester is home to many artists and seemingly as many perfect eateries. The old mill town of approx. 4,000 is a proverbial stone’s throw from Long Island Sound. Every summer’s Sunday, Chester hosts a morning market right on main street which attracts locals and tourists in equal droves.
And, apparently, Bentley Azure convertibles.
This Bentley, an example of the current (2nd) generation Arnage-based Azure, is positioned right where a stand selling live Fishers Island lobsters stood only an hour earlier. Interesting how the current Azure seems to be popular in this handsome black over cream combination whereas its esteemed predecessor was more often commissioned in actual azure blue over cream.
Rolling sculpture.
Bentley Mulsanne In The Company’s 91st Year.
by Gunnar Heinrich ::: img Bentley Motors ::: Bentley Mulsanne 2010/2011
BENTLEY is 90 and 1/2 years old.
In tandem with its 90th year, at 2009’s Pebble Beach, Bentley unveiled the Rolls-Royce Phantom fighting Mulsanne (pronounced “MUL-SAHN”) a from-the-ground-up new saloon that launches the marque headlong into the new millenium with plenty of the last century’s classic folly.
The scope of the Mulsanne, like its esteemed rival, is monumental.
Two-hundred and nineteen inches stem to stern. Fifty nine inches tall.
Twin-Turbo’d V8 produces 505 bhp @ 4200 rpm, 752 torques @ 1750 rpm (!) which is power channeled through a ZF 8 speed cog swapper which in turn pushes the 5700 pound chariot to 60 mph in just 5.1 seconds and then beyond 180 mph when the road, weather, and law permits (which of course, it never does).
Phew! What a car.
The Mulsanne début coincides with the 2010 Rolls-Royce Ghost, a car very much slotted to be more Rolls-Royce’s everyday driver, compared to the larger-than-life Phantom.
Whether potential owners are doing much cross-shopping between the two different echelons – and whether the Mulsanne will sap some sales from the Continental Flying Spur – the VW Phaeton based four-door saloon remains to be seen.
All told, for an exclusive marque approaching its 91st year; having lived past the Great Depression and weathering the Great Recession thus far, the Mulsanne represents a bully effort.
eBay Watch: 1996 Bentley Azure
by Gunnar Heinrich ::: img via eBay ::: 1996 Bentley Azure Convertible
IN the 90s, there was no greater rolling statement than the Bentley Azure.
Big, beautiful, hide-bound, and heaven sent, the Azure was sculpture. Automotive art in absolute finest form. The Azure was also exclusive – for the price of one, you could have two Ferrari F355’s with change left over for a mega-yacht charter round the Mediterranean for you and your closest friends for a week.
Certainly, this décapotable had its faults to pigeon hole. The Azure’s Pininfarina-penned architecture, for instance, was dated before it started production. That turbo’d V8 was Anti-Deluvian. The rear window was made of plastic, not glass.
Plastic rear window on a $300K+ auto? Sir, this is a Bentley. Even with a plastic rear windscreen – there is nothing finer. And there really isn’t.
Not that we should really take umbrage. For this grand tourer’s meant for fair weather. This is all a nice intro to this Pompano Beach sourced, white on cream Azure from 1996. With a scant 38,000 miles on the clock and a buy-it-now price of $68,900, it seems too good to be true.
Which means it may just be. Caveat emptor – maintenance on any Bentley is not for the faint of heart. That said, it’s a buyer’s market. And a brilliant car. And still, the perfect rolling statement…
Beijing Motor Show: “Exclusively For China”
by Gunnar Heinrich ::: img withdrawn Citroën advert via Jack Yan’s Blog ::: 2010 Beijing Motor Show
CAR companies are falling over themselves to cater exclusively to the Chinese consumer this year; 2010 being the first full year that the PRC counts as the world’s largest automotive market.
As an American consumer, I feel a little slighted. What have we been all these years, chopped liver?
Let’s leave the political, economic, and perhaps social ramifications of this attention shift aside, and also that little factor that we might all be at war over Taiwan, Near-East oil, or somebody’s loss of face inside 20 years, and consider that the US car market, perhaps still the world’s most lucrative in terms of real dollars and cents, has seldom in recent times been the platform for such grand débuts or special acknowledgments by foreign car makers.
Here’s an informal rundown of pre-Beijing Motor Show announcements:
- BMW announced a solely-for-China Long-Wheelbase 5-Series
- Mercedes said they’d début the CLS Shooting Brake Concept (at the New York Auto Show, their big announcement was the updated R-Class – joy!)
- Ferrari’s billing it’s new 599GTO as its “fastest road car ever”
- VW will show off its new flagship Phaeton
- Citroën announced the Metropolis concept, designed and built in China
- Maybach’s unveiling its fresh new face to its über-saloon at Beijing (again, why not NY?)
- Bentley’s press release read “EXCLUSIVELY FOR CHINA” as they announced the Bentley Continental Flying Spur Speed China (say that ten times fast in Mandarin) and the Continental GT Design Series China
And so on and so forth. Yes, China is presently the great new over-heated economic frontier.
That said, let’s not forget that India and Brazil are also emerging as meaty new markets, too. And neither of these countries’ governments force foreign car companies to embed with domestic car makers.
You know, once you share trade secrets with your corporate partner, when you’re no longer a collaborative force the other party tends to remember all your best plays.
Given that Chinese corporate culture is as transparent as dragon scales and that the government’s penchant for subversive market intervention is quite real (Google), there’s a distinctly awful possibility that the auto industry’s zealous forays into the Land of Mao could backfire horribly in years to come.
Ah, well. We live to learn don’t we?
Bentley Driver’s Must Read: Bentley Continental, Corniche, & Azure 1951-2002
by Gunnar Heinrich ::: img Veloce ::: Bentley Continental, Corniche, & Azure 1951-2002
LISTED fourth down on a roster that reads like a mid-20th Century Who’s Who , American racing legend Briggs Cunningham took delivery of BCA4 (built expressly for him without emblems or mascots and in right-hand drive by coachbuilder exemplar, H.J. Mulliner) on what must’ve been a beautiful summer day in 1952.
The car that Mr. Cunningham received was the newly minted Bentley R Type Continental -Britain’s first post-war supercar; a unique-to-Bentley 2+2 grand tourer; a classic today.
Martin Bennett chronicles Mr. Cunningham’s superlative car and others in Bentley Continental, Corniche & Azure 1951-2002 published by Veloce and distributed by Motorbooks.
Two hundred and fifty two pages (256, if you count the three full-page RR/Bentley service adverts at the back), the UK turned Aussie native’s work is by all accounts a well documented history of postwar Bentley coupes up until the introduction of the VW Phaeton based GTs.
In exchange for this informational over-abundance (including such finite details as how Bentley management chose to fit the seats of the magnificent 90s Azure into the Continentals R and T for ease of ingress and egress), and perhaps with the type of customer in mind, the publisher demands a Bentleyesque price – $150 suggested retail.
With razor focus, Mr. Bennett chronicles the only Bentleys to be visually and somewhat mechanically unique of their Rolls-Royce stablemates (except for the 70s & 80s Corniche) – a rarity in the annals of the two marque’s long-entwined history.
Lacking the comprehensiveness of Anthony Bird & Ian Hallows’s The Rolls-Royce Motor Car and the Bentley since 1931, but similar in grace of presentation (art deco titles with smarty organized listings) Mr. Bennett’s work will in presentation and informational offerings appeal directly to those precious few who count themselves privileged to own a Continental, Corniche, or Azure.
Mr. Bennett stolidly delivers the essential aspects of the Continental as he describes in the text’s introduction:
“The appellation ‘Continental’ is perhaps the most evocative in Bentley history, conjuring as it does visions of fast motoring to the South of France, or through the Alps Maritimes, with silken power clothed in supremely elegant coachwork, and drivers and passengers enveloped in the heady aroma of Connolly hides and the rich glow of fine woodwork.”
Mr. Cunningham doubtless thought the same of his first Continental.
Ed. note: Motorbooks furnished the reviewer (yours truly) with a copy of this prodigious text.
Rolls-Royce Opens Kuala Lumpur Showroom, Brings Worldwide Dealership Count to 83
By Gunnar Heinrich
AN interesting bit of news recently from Rolls-Royce.
The company reported last week that they granted their own royal warrant to Quill Motor Cars of Kuala Lumpur to be Royce’s official sales presence in Malaysia.
Asian Tiger economies and all that…
This addition lifts the marque’s global sales force to 83 official dealers. In the US, Rolls-Royce is present in 18 states with 12 dealerships split evenly between California and Florida, alone.
By contrast, divorced other-half Bentley has 40 dealerships in America and continues to enjoy its own presence in Kuala Lumpur.
