The Collector
Although I’ve never jumped into the ocean to save a human life, I’d like to think I’ve rescued more than my fair share of automobiles. Back in the early 1990s I became enamoured of Bentleys, especially the WOs made between 1919 and 1931. Much like my fellow Americans, WO Bentley believed there was no replacement for displacement. And rather than supercharge or turbocharge his engines he just increased their size, starting with the 3 Litre in 1919 and ending with the 8 Litre in 1931.
Back 30 or 40 years ago Bentley racing cars were all the rage – and they still are. It’s hard to believe that as late as the early 1990s people were still cutting up perfectly nice Bentley sedans with original coachwork to turn them into Le Mans replicas. I think that would have been the fate of my 1931 8 Litre Mulliner had I not intervened. Believe me, this was not some derelict hulk rotting in a barn somewhere, although it had been at one time. I am told that originally it belonged to the Ambassador of Chile and had been abandoned as a chicken coop when no longer needed.
Someone did a painstaking restoration when it was brought back to the States. It’s an enormous vehicle with a wheelbase of 156 inches. The only car bigger was the Bugatti Royale, with a wheelbase of 169.3in. Even the mighty Duesenberg, with its powerful twin-cam 421ci, 265bhp engine, was shorter at 153.5in.
When I first saw it, it looked OK but needed engine work. The other fella who was interested in it saw it only for what it could be: another full Bentley team car or some Jumbo Goddard look-alike.
I remember back in the 1980s seeing about half a dozen of these 250 GTO replicas that had been built out of Ferrari 330 2+2s or 400is. Donor cars were then in the $20,000-30,000 range and some of the replicas had handmade aluminium bodies that looked pretty good: for less than 10% of the cost of a real one, you could have a ‘GTO’ with an original Ferrari powertrain. I’d love to drive one of these up to the Ferrari Classiche centre and say: ‘So guys – what do you think?’ And then try to get away before they string me up.
When I first got the Mulliner, some of my friends were stunned. ‘What are you going to do with a giant four-door Bentley?’ Drive it, I said. Remembe
