Bentley Arnage Mulliner Edition, Pristine-12 K Miles, Rear Entertainment on 2040-cars

Auto blog

Bentley putting Mulsanne-based Azure, Brooklands back on the table [w/poll]

Big plans are afoot at Bentley. The quintessentially British automaker has just about signed off on the final version of its new SUV, and will surely roll out more versions of the Continental in the coming years, but that's not all. It's said to be considering a new sports coupe smaller than the Continental GT, but the latest reports coming in from the UK suggest that it also has plans for the Mulsanne's platform.
Currently, the Mulsanne is only available in one configuration, but Bentley is widely expected to be bringing a new, more powerful Mulsanne Speed to the Paris Motor Show this fall with around 550 horsepower. That's not all, however, as word comes in that the Flying B marque is planning to re-introduce both the Azure and the Brooklands as competitors to the Rolls-Royce Phantom DHC and Phantom Coupe, respectively.
For those who don't remember, the Azure and Brooklands were a pair of two-doors based on the Arnage that preceded the Mulsanne at the top of Bentley's range. The Azure was a convertible and the Brooklands a fixed-roof coupe, both of them larger than the Continental GT and powered by the company's evergreen (yet decidedly un-green) 6.75-liter V8.

Bentley shifting W12 engine production to UK

Who would you think would be the largest producer of 12-cylinder engines in the world? Mercedes? BMW? Ferrari? Think again: as you might have guessed from the headline, it's Bentley. The thing is that, while all Bentley automobiles are manufactured in the UK, its engines aren't: while the 6.75-liter V8 in the Mulsanne is made at home, the innovative 6.0-liter twin-turbo W12 engine in Continental models so equipped (like the newer 4.0-liter twin-turbo V8) is shipped in from Germany. But that won't be the case any longer.
Bentley has just announced that production of the W12 engine is moving to its home base in Crewe by the end of this year. The shift in production (which follows the migration of the Flying Spur from Dresden to Crewe in 2007) will create 100 jobs in the UK - a country which employs some 142,000 workers in the automotive sector - and produce as many as 9,000 engines per year. That in and of itself would account for the vast majority of the 10,000-plus cars Bentley made last year, but will also make Bentley an exporter of engines for the first time in its history.
Right there at the factory, Bentley will fit the engines into twelve-cylinder versions of the Continental GT, GTC and Flying Spur, and send some back to Germany for use in the Audi A8. Applications within the Volkswagen brand itself like the Phaeton and Touareg no longer use the W12 engine, but could conceivably use it again in the future - they'll just have to bring them in from England is all.

2014 Bentley Continental GT Speed arrives as the fastest Flying B to date

We know what you must be thinking: another Bentley Continental. And we can hardly argue with you, because that's exactly what this is. But what you're actually looking at is the fastest production Bentley ever.
It's the new Continental GT Speed, and it's just been unveiled in both coupe and convertible form here in Geneva. Its 6.0-liter twin-turbo W12 engine has been tuned to deliver 626 horsepower to all four wheels. That's just five horses more than the previous Continental Supersports, but with all the other enhancements applied to the Conti in the mid-cycle refresh, it's actually faster.
While the previous Supersports could reach 204 miles per hour, the new GT Speed can hit 206. (The revised drop-top GTC Speed is quoted at 203 mph, one tick faster than the Supersports Convertible). Of course none of that will, practically speaking, mean anything in real-world driving (especially considering that Crewe hasn't released any acceleration figures), but is worth that extra bit of bragging rights. It also sets the stage nicely for the next Supersports model, which in this context ought to be even faster and more powerful.