History

History of WO Bentley – The Man and the Motors

In 1905, at the age of sixteen, WO Bentley started work as an apprentice for the Great Northern Railway at the Doncaster Locomotive Works. Within four years he had become a fireman on express trains. In 1912 his love of trains turned to a passion for motor cars when he and his brother Horace established their company, Bentley and Bentley, which was a UK agency for the French DFP sports cars.

During a visit to the DFP factory in France WO noticed an unusual paperweight – an aluminium piston. Having been racing the DFP’s himself, he decided to experiment with this light weight material and installed aluminium pistons in his race car. It wasn’t long before this bought success, as WO beat a Brooklands class record.

The onslaught of the Great War saw WO turning his engineering skills to more serious matters. Exploiting his knowledge of aluminium pistons he developed the Bentley Rotary Engine (BR1 and BR2). These were used to power the Sopwith Camel as favoured by the Royal Navy Air Service.

In 1919, after the war, WO created a new company, Bentley Motors Ltd where together with Frank Burgess and Harry Varley they developed their first 3 litre engine. By early 1920 the engine was tested in EXP 1, the first chassis developed at the new company. Later that year construction was started on the Bentley factory in Cricklewood, North London.

At Brooklands in 1921 EXP 2 became the first Bentley motor car to win a race. This was the beginning of the racing pedigree enjoyed by Bentley motor cars for many years. The 1922 Isle of Man TT Team Race was won by a three Bentley team and later that year the first production model rolled out of the factory at Cricklewood.

Finishing 4th in his specially prepared Bentley 3 litre at the first ever 24 hour race at Le Mans in 1923 was not good enough for John Duff. He returned a year later to win the race – the first of many Le Mans wins for Bentley.

In 1926 the six cylinder 6½ litre engine was introduced, later to become the Speed Six model, to accommodate the popular 4 seater bodies which were causing the 3 litre engine performance to struggle a little. This year also saw the company being sold to Wolf Bernato due to financial difficulties.

Shortly after winning it’s second race at Le Mans in 1927 Bentley released the 4 ¼ litre model. This engine was able to deal with the heavier of the bodies and also be competitive on the racing scene.

1928 saw the dawning of the Bentley Boys, a group of rich Bentley drivers who entered races as a team, winning a 1st at Le Mans that year in the prototype 4 ½ litre, “Mother Gun”.

In 1929 one of the Bentley Boys, Sir Henry Birkin, developed a supercharged version of the 4 ½ litre model. This year also saw another win at Le Mans, this time by a light bodied Speed Six.

The Wall Street crash of 1929 seemed to influence all walks of life and Bentley sales were drastically affected. However, in 1930 a six cylinder 8 litre model was released which was able to propel the heavy bodied cars at more than 100mph. Yet another Le Mans win was achieved in 1930 by Mother Gun and a Speed Six model won the Double Twelve race at Brooklands.

During the summer of 1931 the financial matters at Bentley Motors had reached the point of no return. Wolf Bernato would not bail them out anymore and Rolls Royce managed to beat off the advances from Napier and bought Bentley Motors.

WO Bentley himself remained at the company until 1935 when Rolls Royce closed their racing department. He went on to work for Lagonda with most of the Rolls Royce racing department where they developed the Lagonda MG45 Rapide. In true WO Bentley style, this went on to win the 1935 Le Mans.