Where has Bentley's super sports car actually gone?
10/19/2018
In 1998 , Volkswagen took over the traditional British manufacturer Bentleyand just one year later, a new super sports car appeared at the Geneva Motor Show, which clearly showed the influence of the Volkswagen Group, especially under the bodywork
The floor assembly came from the Lamborghini Diablo, as did the five-speed gearbox with splitter shift. The eight-liter engine, however, was a new development from the Volkswagen Group. For the description, we refer back to the text published in the magazine "Auto Motor und Sport" on March 10, 1999 :
" VW calls it the W 16, which, however, misses the technical reality. This is because the 16-cylinder engine does not have three banks of cylinders, as prescribed by the W principle, but only two, in each of which the eight cylinders are positioned at a narrow fork angle of 15 degrees to each other. To put it simply: VW has extended the basis, the familiar VR6 engine, by two cylinder units and combined two of the resulting eight cylinders, which represent a mix of in-line engine and V-engine, to form a 16-cylinder engine."
A lot of effort for 630 hp, one would say today, but back then the Bentley BY 8.16 was definitely a benchmark in the sports car world.
As with the Diablo VT, the power was then distributed to all four wheels to ensure a safe drive even at a top speed of 350 km/h (electronically limited).
Incidentally, the design of the 4.432 meter long and exactly two meter wide super sports car was created in Wolfsburg.
Next year, this super sports car will be 20 years old. We would actually like to do a report on the car, which has hardly been seen since then, even though it was clear even before the presentation that series production was hardly being considered. And so it was, but Bentley took part in Le Mans again in 2001. The racing car was called the EXP Speed 8 and the technical basis was provided by the Audi R8 sports prototype, so that once again everything remained in the family.
The whole story about the Bentley BY 8.16 can be found in the Zwischengas magazine archive in the corresponding AMS number .
