Bentley 4½ Litre: history repeating

By Simon Hucknall

| 10 Oct 2024

Classic & Sports Car – Bentley 4½ Litre: history repeating

‘I think the whole thing is crazy. Nobody’ll finish. Cars aren’t designed to stand that sort of strain for 24 hours.’

Today it’s almost unimaginable that those words came from Walter Owen Bentley, the very man whose company was to become inextricably linked with the 24 Hours of Le Mans.

Recounted in his 1958 autobiography, it was a view WO had expressed in 1923, immediately before Bentley Motors’ first outing at the Circuit de La Sarthe.

The Bentley 4½ Litre’s radiator cap marries delightful form with workmanlike function

Had it not been for Bentley agent John Duff’s encouragement, the firm’s founder would not have supported the sole 3 Litre model that had entered the inaugural running of the event.

But by the time Duff and Bentley’s Frank Clement had brought the car home in joint fourth place, WO was hooked.

Seven years and five outright works wins later, Bentley’s Le Mans legacy was entrenched.

Returning to Brooklands with an important and highly original works Bentley 4½ Litre

An important part of that legacy is with us today.

YW 5758, a 1928 Vanden Plas-bodied 4½ Litre, is now widely recognised as the most successful surviving original-bodied Bentley team car from the ‘WO’ era, with a competition provenance that includes not only a notable finish at Le Mans, but also significant results at the important Irish circuits of the day, as well as right here at Brooklands.

Yet its arrival with the works team came during a tumultuous time for Bentley, making its competition roll-call, to which we’ll return, appear even more impressive.

The Bentley 4½ Litre carries a spare wheel on both sides

Perennially underfunded, with a level of ambition that outstripped his managerial nous, WO had started looking for a financier as early as 1925; two years later he had secured the substantial backing of wealthy Bentley racer Woolf Barnato, which in effect saved the company and its workforce – at least temporarily.

For WO it meant he could refocus his efforts on developing a new generation of cars to succeed the existing 3 Litre, which was coming under threat from sporting tourers such as Vauxhall’s 30-98.

The 6.6-litre, six-cylinder 6½ Litre and 4.4-litre, four-cylinder 4½ Litre were Bentley’s response: their engines were essentially modular versions of one another, each sharing a 100mm bore and 140mm stroke.

The Bentley 4½ Litre’s hemp-wrapped steering wheel and scuffed cockpit

Advanced for its day, the 4½ Litre’s 4398cc monobloc ‘four’, like the 6½ Litre, used an overhead cam to actuate four valves per cylinder, when almost all rivals had sidevalve engines with half as many valves.

Standard output was 110bhp, but in competition guise, as in ‘our’ car, it made 130bhp.

Underpinning the 4½ Litre was a chassis based largely on the 3 Litre’s, using the longest of that model’s three wheelbase options, at 3302mm.

Upon its launch in 1927, the 4½ Litre was demonstrably superior to its predecessor.

The Bentley 4½ Litre’s four-speed gearbox is located next to your right knee

Revised steering and brakes made for more wieldy dynamics, and it was lighter and more manageable than the 6½ Litre, making it the sweet spot of Bentley’s range.

The larger engine made it a more biddable machine on road and track versus the 3 Litre, and in standard tune power increased by 40bhp over the older car.

Perhaps more important, the unit turned out to be almost unbreakable, suffering only one failure in its contemporary racing career.

So you can understand WO’s consternation about force-feeding it with more power.

The Bentley 4½ Litre has a period-correct, manually operated lap counter

This was a concept championed by ‘Bentley Boy’ (the name was originally coined for the works mechanics, but hijacked by the media to describe the drivers) Sir Henry ‘Tim’ Birkin, for whom WO’s race strategy of only running cars fast enough to stay in front, and no faster, was anathema.

Financed by wealthy racehorse owner Dorothy Paget and, perhaps naïvely, supported by Barnato in his new role as company chairman, Birkin commissioned Amherst Villiers to design a supercharger installation for the 4.4-litre engine, with 50 cars (the minimum number to go racing) to be produced.

As a blown unit, power increased radically, from the 130bhp of the atmospheric race cars to 175bhp.

The Bentley 4½ Litre’s busy dashboard incorporates an array of dials and controls

From the off, the ‘Blower’ Bentley was a hugely quick car. But it never won a race.

In its first outing at the 1929 Brooklands Six Hour, its performance wowed but it failed to finish, with a Speed Six cruising to a win and YW 5758 coming third.

At the 1930 24 Hours of Le Mans – which, in WO’s mind anyway, pitted Bentley’s blown and unblown works cars head-to-head – Speed Sixes came in first and second, with engine failure causing the two Blowers to retire after 20 and 21 hours respectively.

This Bentley 4½ Litre is a very original survivor

Small wonder, then, that, along with the impact of 1929’s Wall Street Crash, WO cited the Blower as a key factor in Bentley’s downfall, which ultimately placed it in the hands of Rolls-Royce from 1931.

All of this brings us back to ‘our’ car, which, you imagine, would have been well regarded by WO, as a works car that represented the pinnacle of his company’s engineering brilliance.

That this Bentley was not only raced extensively when new, but almost continually until the end of the 20th century, makes its story even more compelling.

The Bentley 4½ Litre in action in the 1929 Brooklands Six Hour race © WOBMF

Purchased by Humphrey Cook – a financier of Raymond Mays’ ERA – in 1928, it was immediately pressed into competition at the Newtownards Tourist Trophy in Northern Ireland, where it finished second in class and seventh overall before a crowd of 250,000.

In just six months of 1929, it entered almost every red-letter race available to the Bentley works team.

It got off to an inauspicious start on 10-11 May at the Brooklands Double Twelve, where a rare engine issue caused it to retire.

Frank Clement (at the wheel) and Jack Barclay pictured with YW 5758 © Brooklands Museum

We’ll return to its next outing at Le Mans shortly, but after that it was back to Brooklands on 30 June for the Six Hour, where, in the hands of Cook, it achieved a first in class and third overall.

On 12 July, YW 5758 was entered in the inaugural Irish International Grand Prix at Phoenix Park in Dublin, finishing fifth overall.

It rounded off its season in grand style at Brooklands with an outright win in the 500 Miles Race – at the time the world’s fastest long-distance event, and the first held by the British Racing Drivers’ Club – driven by Jack Barclay and Frank Clement.

‘Barclay was at full pelt on the Members’ Banking when it went into a high-speed slide’ © Brooklands Museum

Fitted with a streamlined body, the car very nearly came to grief, though: Barclay was at full pelt on the Members’ Banking when it went into a high-speed slide.

The moment was captured in a still, with the Bentley at an angle to the banked track and apparently driverless: Barclay, expecting the car to roll, had ducked below the scuttle to prevent decapitation.

Disaster was somehow averted, however, and Barclay and Clement drove on to victory at a spectacular average speed of 107.32mph.

The Bentley 4½ Litre’s 21in wheels have replaced a set of non-original 19s

It was, however, YW 5758’s role at the 1929 24 Hours of Le Mans – a now legendary event in Bentley’s history – that sealed its near-incomparable provenance.

One of five cars entered by the factory that year, it was driven by Frenchman Jean Chassagne along with Clement, the latter Bentley’s only professional driver and one held in the highest esteem by WO.

Three other 4½ Litre tourers were entered, driven by Glen Kidston and Jack Dunfee (in ‘Mother Gun’); Dr Dudley Benjafield and Baron André d’Erlanger; and a trio made up of Bernard Rubin and Francis Curzon (Earl Howe) in the final car.

Barnato and Birkin completed the set driving ‘Old Number One’, the equipe’s only Speed Six entry that year.

The Bentley 4½ Litre’s oversize fuel tank is mounted aft of its rear axle

The race is perhaps only truly memorable for the team’s dominance of the event, seemingly achieved with minimal effort.

Once again, WO mandated that his cars be driven just quickly enough to lead – which, at one point, had Dunfee stopping for a drink at the Café de l’Hippodrome after racing too far ahead.

Other than the Rubin/Curzon car retiring after three hours with an electrical fault, the only real drama affected Clement in YW 5758.

At one point the car was second behind the Barnato/Birkin Speed Six, when its ballast – required in this ‘touring’ car to represent a passenger’s weight – shifted.

Commemorating the Bentley 4½ Litre’s outright win in the 1929 500 Miles Race at Brooklands

It caused the body to foul the brake rods beneath it, with one rod breaking.

Clement was driving and forced to pit, saying later: “Of course, I had to get that thing [the ballast] back – it’d got to go back in its bolts, then I had to put an adaptor on the end of the brake rod.

“[Bentley mechanic] Hassan told me what I had to do. He was very wonderful.”

But all was not lost. The car was straggling well behind in eighth when it returned to the track, but by 10am it had passed the Stutz and Chrysler entries – Bentley’s only real rivals in the race – and fallen into line behind its three teammates to make up the first four positions.

The Bentley 4½ Litre returns to the historic banked track at Brooklands in Surrey

And that is how the Bentley team completed the race, in close formation, with YW 5758 bringing up the rear and Old Number One first over the line.

‘Our’ car had covered a total of 157 laps, 17 behind the winning Speed Six.

YW 5758’s races were certainly not over, not by any means.

Well-known Bentley dealer Barclay bought the car after Le Mans in 1929, before selling it on to Lord Brougham Vaux the following year.

Frank Clement and this Bentley 4½ Litre at Le Mans in 1929 © WOBMF

It changed hands again in ’31, with one John Carlson taking ownership for the next two years, coinciding with a run of second and third positions in consecutive Gold Star Handicaps.

After another keeper, the car was bought by JP Emons, a founding member of the Bentley Drivers Club.

Emons, and the next three owners – along with previous custodians Harry Rose and daughter Ann Shoosmith, who took it on in 1957 – contributed to an almost continuous competition history, including the Le Mans Classic, Brighton Speed Trials, and races and hillclimbs too numerous to mention.

Jean Chassagne climbs out of the Bentley’s cockpit as Frank Clement jumps in during a pitstop at the Circuit de La Sarthe © WOBMF

However, current owner Dr Ian Andrews, who purchased the Bentley 25 years ago, has never been near a race track – at least, not to compete.

“I’m not a racing driver,” confesses Ian, “so there’s nothing I can add to its racing provenance.”

It is a pragmatic and honest admission, and one that will certainly help preserve what is now an extremely rare and hugely valuable motor car for the future – and preservation has been Ian’s watchword.

Resisting the temptation to simply restore the car to concours standard, he has focused on a programme of conservation, which has left the Bentley gloriously patinated and almost uniquely original compared with many other pre-war racers.

The Bentley 4½ Litre’s bonnet has leather straps

Ian is passionate about this, saying: “The car has such a pure history and spirit, and there’s an aura about it – a historical signature you just cannot buy.”

Which is why he initially turned down an approach from Bentley Motors in 2009 to display YW 5758 at Pebble Beach, thinking that its smart but non-concours appearance would leave judges nonplussed.

As it turned out, its authenticity was welcomed, and the car returned from California with a second-in-class trophy, the highest place that year for any Bentley team car among a star-studded group including 3 Litre, 4½ Litre, Speed Six and Blower entrants.

The Bentley’s 4.4-litre ‘four’ produced 130bhp in its racing specification

Inevitably, Bentley invited Ian and YW 5758 back to Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance in 2019, where it took another second in class.

Ian has also won a Fédération Internationale des Véhicules Anciens (FIVA) award, in 2000, again for the car’s originality.

There have been no shortage of invitations to Goodwood’s Festival of Speed, where it has graced the Duke of Richmond’s hillclimb on many occasions.

Today, back at one of its spiritual homes, this prized Bentley looks magnificent.

The Bentley 4½ Litre is an imposing machine, even at a sedate pace

Tall, imposing and once again bearing on its radiator the painted ‘8’ that it wore at Le Mans nearly a century ago, YW 5758 is testament not only to Ian’s passion for maintaining its link with the past, but also to the sheer longevity of a well-used example of what Ettore Bugatti reportedly described as ‘le camion plus vite du monde’ (the world’s fastest lorry).

Everywhere you look, the car’s provenance is laid bare: the original eyebrow wings now frame 21in wires, after a spell running on 19s; removing the original leather driver’s seat cushion reveals a flap to access an inflatable bag inside, offering an early form of seat-height adjustment; a St Christopher medal is screwed to the passenger door card and just below it, to the side of the footwell, is a policeman’s light for emergency night-time repairs on track.

Ian also points to the original engine undertrays and, aft of the rear axle, the industrial-sized petrol tank, which retains its original lagging (all team cars’ tanks were so modified from 1924).

This Bentley 4½ Litre’s undertrays are original

And then we’re behind the hemp-wrapped, 20in steering wheel with which Clement and Barclay would have wrestled at this very location, 95 years ago.

Twin magneto switches are located to your right, and no fewer than seven dials are dotted haphazardly across the rest of the dash, the largest of which is a Jaeger tachometer redlined at 4000rpm.

Behind me, the rear passenger space is covered with a tonneau, secured to a bulkhead into which the front seats are inset – a unique arrangement that provides this car with a distinctive profile.

The Bentley 4½ Litre’s patina underscores its startling originality

Fire up the 4.4-litre ‘four’ and a majestically loud burble erupts from the straight-through exhaust.

Engage first in the H-pattern, inboard gate next to your right knee and press gently on the long, floor-mounted centre throttle: the 4½ Litre moves away at little more than a fast idle.

Despite weighing 3600lb – typical of a big tourer from this era – the Bentley feels more substantial, not just in the way it moves down the track, but also in the heft of its controls; a 30-98 racer feels lithe in comparison.

Take your time with the four-speed crash ’box and the gears mesh with well-oiled ease.

The Bentley 4½ Litre’s large Jaeger tachometer nestles behind the 20in steering wheel

We have limited time on Brooklands’ bumpy Finishing Straight, but it’s just enough to capture an essence of what WO’s team drivers would have endured in period (albeit at three times our speed), their focus razor-sharp, tucked down below the aeroscreen, chequered flag in sight.

Only in the genuine article can you come so close to experiencing such a thrill, and there is no better example of that than YW 5758.

Images: Max Edleston

Thanks to: Brooklands Museum; Allan Winn

Factfile

Bentley 4 ½ Litre

Sold/number built 1927-1931/667
Construction ash body frame with aluminium panels, separate steel chassis
Engine all-iron, ohc monobloc 4398cc ‘four’ with four valves per cylinder, twin SU G5 ‘sloping’ carburettors
Max power 110bhp (130bhp in racing spec)
Max torque n/a
Transmission four-speed manual, RWD
Suspension: front H-section axle rear live axle; semi-elliptic leaf springs, friction dampers f/r
Steering worm and wheel
Brakes drums
Length 14ft 4in (4380mm)
Width 5ft 8in (1740mm)
Height n/a
Wheelbase 10ft 9in (3300mm)
Weight 3600lb (1625kg)
Mpg n/a
0-60mph n/a
Top speed 90mph
Price new n/a
Price now £450-500,000 (non-competition car)*