T1/2 – 1965-80

The Bentley T1 was a milestone for Rolls- Royce, having taken some 11 years to develop and along with the Silver Shadow was the firm’s first car to use monocoque construction rather than a separate chassis. Regarded as the firm’s most complex model to that date, the T1 brought Bentley right up to date and offered a mighty list of luxury kit sufficient to challenge rivals like the Mercedes 600.

The gearbox was Hydramatic with no manual option, while windows, seats, filler cap, aerial, air conditioning and heating were all electric. Again keeping in step with the high- end offerings from Stuttgart, the coil sprung T1 borrowed Citroën technology for its self-levelling system, using pumps driven from the camshaft to power a hydraulic system. The T1 also boasted power disc brakes and the car’s all-alloy 6230cc V8 was uprated to 6750cc in 1970 and could now push out around 220bhp – although Bentley still avoided quoting official power output.

Meanwhile, Bentley’s parent company was suffering financial traumas due to the development costs for the RB 211 aero engine and declared itself bankrupt in February 1971. A government eager to protect its defence secrets promptly nationalised the business but the car division was floated separately in 1973 and despite the oil crises of the period, the car business was by then in profit once more.

In 1977 the Bentley became the T2, receiving a mild facelift that included wrap-around black bumpers and a front spoiler. Suspension was tweaked to improve handling and the car gained rack-and-pinion steering but performance was unchanged. Vickers acquired Rolls-Royce in 1980 just as the company was about to replace the T-Series/Shadow cars. Although the Silver Shadow was destined to become the best-selling Rolls-Royce model ever, notching up 34,611 sales until its replacement in 1981, the Bentley badge had clearly lost its appeal: just 1703 T1s were sold against 16,717 Shadows, with the Bentley T2 finding 558 owners against the Shadow II’s 8425.