Bentley Celebrates 60 Years Of Its V8 Engine

Bentley is celebrating 60 years of its V8 engine which is the longest serving engine in production in its segment. The 6.25-litre V8 engine was designed back in 1959 and the British carmaker has manufactured 35,898 units since then. The motor still does the duty in the Bentley Mulsanne and requires 15 hours to be built. The company says that while every part of the engine has been re-engineered to meet current days' standards, the dimension has remained the same.

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Werner Tietz, Member of the Board, Engineering at Bentley Motors said, 'The original V8 was designed to deliver a step-change in performance, along with smoothness, reliability and refinement. The engine was tested over hundreds of thousands of miles in the toughest conditions, as well as at full throttle for 500 hours. The success of Bentley's acclaimed 6.25 litre V8 today in the Mulsanne owes much to that ethos."

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The original V8 engine had to be redesigned to fit into the Bentley T-Series cars introduced in 1965 and the engine capacity was increased to 6.25 litres in 1971 through an increase in stroke from 3.6 to 3.9 inches that delivered even more torque. Then it was heavily modified for the first Bentley Mulsanne that was launched in 1980 in a bid to meet the stringent emission and safety norms. The changes included a collapsible water pump, which effectively shortened the engine by four inches or 10.1 cm. In 1998, the V8 engine also underwent on-going development and models such as the 2008 Bentley Brooklands' V8 motor had its roots in the 1959 original. The engine was upgraded to develop almost 200 per cent more power and torque. Along with the Mulsanne, the V8 engine also is a workhorse for the entire range of Bentley cars including the Flying Spur, Bentayga and Continental GT.