30 Aug 06
This new ESP combines with a proper, modern ZF six-speed automatic gearbox to make the Arnage/driver interface more accurate and transparent than before. It's the unit used in many a rapid, rear-wheel drive car (Aston Martin DB9, Jaguar XK, several BMWs), but endowed here with extra-strong clutches to cope with the engine's extra efforts. In place of the old GM four-speeder's springy, slush-matic feeling that created a power delivery akin to the firing of an elastic band, we now feel an engine positively connected to the driving wheels for much of the time. There's a usable manual mode, too, but you soon realise it's pointless in an engine so torquey, and which reaches its 500bhp power peak (11 per cent up on the old model) at just 4,200rpm.
It's far better just to let it woofle and burble away, throbbing menacingly when aroused, and imagine that there is in fact a mega-torque steam engine in the prow. This is the ultimate development of a V8 engine which has been in production since 1959, its latest output boost the result of two low-inertia Mitsubishi turbos in place of the heftier Garrett units, and of revised valvegear now with roller rockers to allow more accurate control of the single camshaft's valve timing.
This is crucial to the extra urge. Even the greatest technophobe can't fail to be intrigued by Bentley powertrain director Brian Gush's enthusiasm for the arcane aspects of camshaft profiles; he told me, for example, that the reason Italian engines used to have such a sporty rasp was the particular type of 'opening ramp' Italian engineers used in their camshafts, which gave a very sudden valve opening. So now you know.
No-one predicted back in 1959 that the all-aluminium Rolls-Royce/Bentley V8 would still be in production nearly half a century later, nor that today's engine, which has grown from 6230cc to 6761cc, is 2.5 times more powerful than that 1959 original, uses 60 per cent as much fuel and emits 99 per cent less toxic gas. 'The connecting rods are like a steam engine's,' says engineering director Ulrich Eichhorn. 'Only now, with modern bearing technology, are we finally making proper use of the engine's strength.'
