BENTLEY MULSANNE SPEED FINAL DRIVE
Bentley’s magnificent Mulsanne has been retired, and with it, after six decades of service, the marque’s mighty 6.75‑litre V8. To bid farewell, we take a final drive with both in their ultimate forms, in the 530bhp, 811lb ft Mulsanne Speed
Bentley’s flagship saloon is no more, and the firm’s 6.75-litre V8 has departed with it. Richard Meaden reminds us why they’ll be missed
IF THE MULSANNE SPEED WAS A blockbuster Hollywood film franchise it would be less Fast & Furious, more Vast & Luxurious. At more than 5.5 metres in length, tipping the scales at 2685kg and costing upwards of £250,000, it was, until very recently, Bentley’s flagship. Sadly, after a decade and some 7300 cars built, production of the Mulsanne ceased earlier this year.
With it went the legendary 6.75-litre V8. Fondly referred to as the ‘six-and-three-quarter’ by those in the know, this engine could trace its roots all the way back to 1959. In continuous production ever since, and fitted to an unbroken succession of series production models right up until the Mulsanne reached the end of the road, this recordbreaking run eclipses even that most celebrated of V8s, the ubiquitous small-block Chevy.
The bones of Bentley’s venerable L-series engine may famously date back decades and decades and decades, but it has been continually refined and re-engineered. Highlights include the adoption of forced induction back in 1982 when the Mulsanne Turbo was introduced. Despite boosting power and torque by 50 per cent, the original Mulsanne Turbo had no suspension changes over the standard car, but there’s no question the cachet of a latter-day ‘blower’ worked wonders for Bentley’s otherwise beleaguered sales.
During the period when BMW owned both Rolls-royce and Bentley there was a phase when the six-and-three-quarter looked like it was going to be axed, BMW preferring to slot its own V8 into the Arnage and Rolls Seraph. Then VW acquired Bentley and, in a glorious snub to BMW, reintroduced the 6.75 at the top of the Arnage range. Named ‘Red Label’, it proved far more popular than the unloved Bmw-engined ‘Green Label’, and the latter was soon removed from the line-up.
Given this backstory it’s no surprise the 6.75 received its most extensive redesign under the Volkswagen Group’s tenure. Still lovingly hand assembled, but with twin turbos, a new cylinder head design, cylinder deactivation to save fuel and variable valve timing for the single-cam pushrod top end (still with just two valves per cylinder), only the most basic architecture – namely the bore diameter and cylinder spacing – of its substantially stiffened aluminium block remained unchanged. The phrase ‘Trigger’s Broom’ springs to mind.
Tenuous it may be, but this unmatched lineage forms a silken thread that runs back through almost half the automobile’s existence. That the last iteration produced is 99 per cent cleaner than the first, and could actually idle on the tailpipe emissions of its most distant forebear, is testament to a remarkable engineering evolution. If any engine’s passing deserves a requiem it is this.
Such longevity and permanence is impressive, but what connects us to this last-of-a-kind Bentley is the manner in which it performs. Not so much the fact this block of flats will touch 190mph and accelerate from 0 to 62mph in 4.9sec, but more because it’ll barely break into a sweat while doing so.
I’ve long believed exceptional internal combustion engines trigger a deeper emotional and sensory connection to the machines they power. That’s why we look up when we hear a Supermarine
Spitfire fly overhead, and why crowds of people flock to be near exotic Grand Prix cars, Le Mans prototypes or rally cars when they’re about to fire up. Non-sentient they might be, but these machines have their own particular life force.
The Mulsanne Speed makes no such fuss, but it’s as alive as any machine can be. Think about it. An engine, especially one as storied as this, is often described as the heart of a car. It has a pulse. But it also breathes in and out, and has vital cooling and lubricating fluids passing through a network of pipes akin to veins and arteries. And, of course, it expresses itself through the sound it makes and the unique characteristics of its power and torque delivery.
This kind of anthropomorphism might seem like a load of old cobblers, but I defy anyone to spend time in the Mulsanne Speed and not feel themselves falling under its spell. The seduction begins before you start the engine. Its sheer pomp and presence is ridiculous, as is the weight of the driver’s door when you swing it open like a bank vault in a heist movie.
All kinds of treasures await inside, from the acres of supple, aromatic hide that’s so neatly and intricately stitched, to the sparkling chrome bezels and switchgear that stud the highgloss Piano Black dashboard and centre console. Magnet for unsightly sticky fingerprints these pristine surfaces may be, but the impression they create is breathtaking, if uncomfortably blingy for some tastes.
Once you’ve climbed up into the lofty seat you’re treated to the most majestic view out across that sprawling bonnet and down to the Flying B mascot perched atop the radiator shell. Like the motor that sits beneath it, this is a scene from the ages. One any Bentley driver would recognise, even WO himself.
You feel the quality in everything you touch, everything you open and close. It just has a sense of being hewn; one solid thing attached to other solid things to create a monolithic build integrity quite unlike in any other car.
Considering its significance, not to mention its central role in the whole Mulsanne driving experience, the Engine Start button is somewhat apologetic in size. No matter, for once you’ve given it a respectful prod the 6.75 more than compensates.
You don’t so much hear it ticking over as feel its presence pulsing through the car. Squeeze the throttle and the body rocks slightly, but you’re otherwise isolated from anything so vulgar as noise, vibration or harshness. Accelerate gently and you hear a barely perceptible purr and feel a magical sense of propulsion. Push the throttle with a little bit more insistence and the note deepens fractionally as the nose begins to rise. It’s the perfect indicator of how hard the car’s working, even though in truth this car never feels like it’s working hard at all. At once serene and intense, it’s an epic way to be pushed down the road.
It’s this boundless sense of elasticity that’s so special. You just stretch the performance of the car that little bit more, by increments, if you like, without ever feeling like it’s reaching its limit. That’s hardly any wonder when you consider it produces 811lb ft of torque (that’s 1100Nm) from 1750rpm and revs to just 4500rpm. Peak power is 530bhp in Speed specification, but that’s inconsequential compared to all that twist action turning the rear wheels. It’s this effortless potency and unruffled oomph that has come to define modern Bentleys. In fact you could say this car and engine combo served as the blueprint for
‘SPENDING TIME IN A MUL SANNE RUINS YOU FOR DRIVING ANYTHING ELSE’
the style of performance the VW Group’s own V8, W12 and hybrid/evs should offer.
That’s not to say you can’t make spirited progress in the Mulsanne. In fact it’s shockingly swift across roads you’d perhaps expect it to be all at sea on. Like the engine there’s a finely judged calmness about the steering and its response. With 3.5 turns lock-to-lock, in place of the synaptic, jolting direction changes we’re used to in aggressive sports and supercars, the Mulsanne takes languid lines, its mass and wheelbase dictating a degree of decorum but doing little to blunt your point-to-point pace.
Some pre-planning is required, for this is not a car in which to smash the brake pedal, stand it on its nose and sling it at an apex, but adopting a lift-and-coast tactic into the braking zones lets the car settle and creates some vital separation between slowing, steering and throttle inputs. Driven thus the Mulsanne is impressively accurate and surprisingly entertaining.
Weight is often named as Enemy No. 1 of performance, efficiency, handling and all the other things that engineers are supposed to strive for. But weight in this context is the thing that gives the Mulsanne Speed its dynamic fingerprint. It’s an absolute force of nature in every respect, but the more you drive it and the more time you spend in it, the more accustomed you become to its way of doing things.
Riding on 21-inch rims puts plenty of rubber on the road. It doesn’t help some aspects of ride quality, as you do sense sharp potholes make the vertical movement of those huge wheels and tyres difficult to contain, but there’s otherwise a general sense of the Mulsanne steamrollering the road into submission. Those generous contact patches enable you to tackle tight corners with more gusto than you might expect too, while fast corners are dispatched with physics-defying aplomb. Yes, there’s some body roll, but it serves as a useful gauge of how hard the chassis is working. Once near its limit the balance is inherently transparent, the nose pushing wide if you carry too much speed or get greedy with the throttle before the apex. However, apply some tricks learned in more overtly sporting cars and you can use a bit of weight transfer to nail the nose and bring the rear end into play. I’d hesitate to coin that racer and road tester’s favourite term and say it rotates, but it will neutralise. Better, if you time everything sweetly and give it the full Woolf Barnato, it’ll exit corners with an appropriately classy degree or two of oversteer before the stability control reins things in.
I’ll admit you do feel a little bit incongruous at the best of times, never more so than if someone happens to spot you gently drifting through a corner. Even if you do your best to style it out it’s clear there’s a mild sense of bewilderment at what they’ve just witnessed. Funnily enough there’s equal bewilderment at what you’ve just experienced from behind the wheel.
Spending time in a Mulsanne absolutely ruins you for driving anything else, though. Other cars suddenly feel tinny and flimsy, insubstantial and lacking in refinement. And they have to work so hard to make progress. The 6.75 totally recalibrates your parameters for how a car should perform.
For all these reasons it’s an enormous shame that Bentley has stopped producing these engines. I’m sure there are ways of replicating the 6.75’s delivery, but it would almost certainly rely on a ton of batteries, well-muffled electric motors and the synthesised murmur of that magnificent V8 piped discreetly into the cockpit. It might feel and sound the same, but it won’t possess the same warmth of character.
Sadly, the only thing which moves with greater inexorability than this majestic machine is time itself. Some might see its discontinuation as a mark of progress, but it leaves me feeling a little melancholy. Many people won’t understand why not having a version of the six-and-threequarter under the bonnet of future Bentleys is so poignant. But in much the same way anyone who has flown on a Boeing 747 feels mournful at the prospect of the Jumbo disappearing from our skies, that engine and the cars it powered were wondrous machines.
Perhaps the six-and-three-quarter’s discontinuation feels more momentous because it is symbolic of the wider auto industry’s severance with its petrol-powered past. In Bentley’s case it also feels like disavowal – albeit a reluctant one – of perceived profligacy. How better to signal an attitudinal and technological shift than by killing off the internal combustion engine that can trace its roots back further than any other?
EV zealots will doubtless say good riddance to a gasguzzling anachronism. In time we may well conclude they have a point. For now, though, we should pause and pay our respects to the last pre-vw Bentley and one of the great engines. One whose character and delivery was as memorable for its near-silence and locomotive-like pulling power as any screaming V12 or snorting straight-six. We shall never see its like again.