► Centenary project relaunches the Blower
► Your chance to own 4½-litre Blower
► New-but-old continuation series
Bentley Motors has announced another centenary surprise – it’s relaunching one of its most iconic models, the 4½-litre Blower, in a new continuation series.
Many manufacturers with long histories have cottoned on to the business opportunity of continuation models, with Jaguar building new D-types and E-types from scratch, even using the excuse of unused serial numbers to legitimise the plundering of the back catalogue. Now Bentley’s joining in.
A dozen recreations will be made by the craftsmen and women at the Mulliner personalisation department in Crewe. They will base the 2019 Bentley Blower on Sir Tim Birkin’s famous 4½-litre Team Blower model, in excruciating detail. Engineers are planning to strip the factory’s own Team Blower and doing a 3D scan of every component, so that every part is true to the original.
‘The 12 continuations will be identical wherever possible to the original – mechanically, aesthetically and spiritually – with only minimal hidden changes dictated by modern safety concerns,’ says Bentley.
Bentley claims this is ‘the world’s first pre-war race car continuation series’ and knowing how rich and storied Crewe’s history books are, we’d be surprised if it’s the last.
Sounds great… how much will the new Bentley Blower continuation cost?
Prices are available ‘on application,’ so if you have to ask, you probably can’t afford one. It will take Mulliner two years to build all dozen cars, so this is a painstaking, slow build process.
Chairman and chief executive Adrian Hallmark said: ‘As we continue to commemorate 100 years of Bentley, we are combining a look to our past with the very latest digital technologies and techniques to create something truly extraordinary. The four Team Blowers are the most valuable Bentleys in the world, and we know there is demand for genuine recreations that can be used, enjoyed and loved without risk to the prized originals.’
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