Blower reborn
In its centenary year, Bentley is building 12 continuation Blowers. Only now, as they dismantle the priceless original, is the scale of the challenge becoming clear…
Recreating the ’20s racer. Not easy
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Earlier this year, Bentley CEO Adrian Hallmark tasked Mulliner special projects man Glyn Davies with drawing up a list of Bentleys ripe for the continuation treatment. Aston’s done it with the DB4 GT, Jaguar with the E-Type Lightweight – Bentley fancied a slice of the action. Top of Davies’ list was the Blower, though he warned the boss he wasn’t sure replicating the ’20s racer was even feasible. Naturally, Hallmark chose the Blower…
Cloning post-war cars is one thing; delivering a dozen perfect reproductions of Bentley’s leviathan legend quite another. Not only is the original enormous, irreplaceable and unique (five were built, of which four raced, and this car, Tim Birkin’s, was much modified), it’s also the product of techniques (hand fabrication, tin bashing, ash framing) lost to mainstream car making long ago.
ASSEMBLE THE DREAM TEAM
The team formed to create the Blowers draws on expertise from within Bentley and beyond. ‘We’ve enlisted the help of several classic Bentley specialists,’ explains Davies. ‘They all have slightly different skill sets that together cover the whole car. There’s so much to source. You think about those headlamps, the work in those alone, and the fuel tank, which is incredibly complex.’ Working alongside them are technicians from Bentley’s Mulliner division and experts from engineering group Envisage.
TREAT DISASSEMBLY LIKE A DIG
The original is being pulled apart at Envisage in Coventry, the Blower surrounded by workbenches like stainless-steel tables in an operating theatre. Over the coming weeks, and for the first time in over half a century, it will be completely disassembled and every part scanned, bagged and catalogued with archaeological rigour. Then begins the process of working out how to make perfect copies of every element, be it the 4.4-litre supercharged four-cylinder engine or its fuel gauge (a fuel-stained wooden stick).
As we watch, the team removes the hood, the seats, the multi-part oak floor and the vast oil-spattered aluminium undertray. You’d be forgiven for thinking that, given the car’s size (wheelbase is over three metres, overall length nearly five), there’d be space to burn inside. But no. The underside of the oak floor is chiselled away to clear the top of the gearbox by millimetres, the recess ringed by holes to fit over the bolt heads in the transmission.
USE TODAY’S EXPERTISE WHERE YOU NEED IT Specialists have been making reproduction engines for some time, and Bentley will embrace advances in metallurgy and design.
‘We built our first blower engine in ’96,’ explains Neil Davies of specialists NDR. ‘Over the years we’ve improved our patterns, so now we’re nigh-on identical to this engine.’ Mulliner’s Glyn Davies adds: ‘Adrian [Hallmark] is keen that the engine goes through the same test beds we use up in Crewe
to evaluate our modern engines. It’s a nice touch, and it’ll ensure all 12 cars have the same power curve.’ Owners can expect 240bhp.
STAY TRUE TO THE OLD TECHNIQUES
‘The Birkin car was privately funded, of course, so already it was one step removed from Bentley, and everything from the chassis up was to Birkin’s design,’ says NDR’s Neil Davies. ‘There are lots of differences between this car and even the other cars made by the same people at the same time.’
Mulliner’s Glyn Davies says: ‘We have drawings for most parts. Where there’s been changes we’ll scan those parts and reverse-engineer them.’
BE IN NO HURRY…
‘The plan is to have a chassis ready in the first quarter of next year,’ says Glyn Davies. ‘We’re looking at the first customer cars by the end of 2020. It’s a big ask. The more you take off, the more daunting the project looks…’
The original’s the product of techniques lost to mainstream car making long ago