A Blown British Brute... [PIC]

W. O. Bentley's philosophy was 'bigger displacement  yields bigger power". By 1927, a new chassis housed a new 4 1/2 liter engine to replace the 3.0. Bentley, however, was firmly against using forced induction as Mercedes had already been using. It was at that time that Bentley lost control of Bentley Motors to its main shareholder, Woolf Barnato, and by 1929, the 4 1/2 liter motor received a Villiers supercharger and was soon heading for a Le Mans win. 55 of the "Blowers" were built for homologation requirements and although the 'Blower's' performance wasn't all that great. it did achieve many wins and speed records at the time. Overall, 740 of the 4 1/2 units were were built ending in 1931. The Franklin Mint model released in the early 2000s was quite an excellent replica for its time and actually stands up well against the 1/18 Minichamps model released about 15 years later.