Found on VIA THEMA website on September 6, 2018
Bentley 4½ Litre Le Mans
Chassis No: FS3612
Engine No: XF3524 (see below)
- 1930
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46,659 Mls
-
Race ready
-
CH title
-
CH/UK taxes paid
- On Request
We are very pleased to be able to offer for sale this very competitive, 17 times Mille Miglia entrant, 1930 Bentley 4½-Litre with Vanden Plas Le Mans Style Tourer Coachwork.
- One of 665 made
- 10'10" wheelbase chassis
- 21th last built 4.5 Litre
- "C" Type Gearbox No: 6559
- Chassis No: FS3612
- Engine No: XF3524 (see below)
- 15/53 ratio back axle
Dr. Clare Hay's authoritative work, Bentley, The Vintage Years, records that chassis number 'FS3612', fitted with engine number 'FS3611' was completed in July 1930 fitted with four-seat tourer coachwork by London-based coachbuilder Vanden Plas. The original registration was 'GJ9176'.
Vanden Plas had been founded in Belgium in the 19th Century, gaining a British offshoot when Warwick Wright obtained the UK rights to the name in 1913. After an uncertain start and numerous changes of ownership, the British firm went on to forge its not inconsiderable reputation by a most fortuitous alliance with Bentley, bodying some 700-or-so of the latter's chassis during the 1920s, including the Le Mans team cars.
This Bentley's first owner was Hon. C.H.G. Mulholland, 3rd Lord Dunleath of Ballywalter Park, Co Down, Northern Ireland. Copy correspondence on file from his son Charles John Mulholland states that the body "certainly wasn't a standard Vanden Plas tourer as it had a wider, all-metal body and fuller wings" and the seating position had been tailor-made in view of his father's six foot 2 and a half inches stature.
Lord Dunleath took delivery of the car on the 4th of July 1930 and used to drive the car all over Ireland and once a year to Scotland in pursuit of his favorite recreation which was shooting. The Service Record notes various works being carried out until 1938.
During WW2, the Bentley was up on blocks in a dry, well maintained garage due to the petrol rationing. Lord Dunleath then sold the car in 1944 to Bentley & Rolls-Royce distributors Agnew & Graham in Belfast for 130 Pound and they subsequently sold the car to a Royal Navy Officer.
The following years, the Bentley changed hands several times with the coachwork being updated and transformed to its current state. It should be noted that the engine has been replaced as well at some time during this period, as registration document records engine no. 'FS3611' whereas the current engine is numbered 'XF3524'.
Typical of what happened to so many Bentleys in the post war period the car received a Vanden Plas-style Le Mans Tourer body, with a folding windshield, Brooklands windscreens, sporting cycle fenders, and synthetic leather over a padded wooden frame interior. It is ironic to think that if they had not been so competitive in sports car racing at the time infinitely more would have remained in their original configuration.
In December 1982 the Bentley was offered for sale by Stanley Mann and was purchased by the current owner, a Bentley Driver's Club member, who registered the car on the 7th May 1983 in Switzerland.
During 35 years of ownership, the owner extensively used the car in all the major historic events and rallies throughout Europe and Africa. Several Mille Miglia's, Monte Carlo, Klausenrennen, Nürburgring, Vernasca Silver Flag, GP of Switzerland, and the Ollon-Villars Hillclimb to name a few.
~ Mille Miglia 17x
~ Bentley Rally South Africa
~ Klausenrennen 3x
~ GP de Montreux
~ Rally de Mont Blanc 10x
~ GP de Lausanne
~ Rally de Monte Carlo 3x
~ GP de Lugano
~ Rally de Mont Jolly 3x
~ GP Nürburgring
~ Vernasca Silver Flag
~ GP de Vichy 3x
~ Ollon Villars HillClimb
~ GP Divonne 10x
The Bentley has always been maintained and prepared by one of Europe's most respected workshops for pre-War cars in Montreux, Switzerland.
Major works include an engine, gearbox and differential rebuild as well as the complete overhaul of the cable operated brake system and drums. Restoration of the radiator and add-on of an alternator.
Offered with a Swiss registration document, 'FS3612' represents a rare opportunity for collectors to obtain a Cricklewood Bentley bodied in the most desirable Vanden Plas 'Le Mans' Team Car style, ready to continue to be enjoyed in events and rallies around the world.
Walter Owen Bentley proudly unveiled the first motorcar bearing his name, on Stand 126 at the 1919 Olympia Motor Exhibition, the prototype engine having fired up for the first time just a few weeks earlier. In only mildly developed form, this was the model which was to become a legend in motor racing history and which, with its leather-strapped bonnet, classical radiator design and British Racing Green livery has become the archetypal vintage sports car.
Early success in the 1922 Isle of Man Tourist Trophy, when Bentleys finished second, fourth and fifth to take the Team Prize, led to the introduction of the TT Replica (later known as the Speed Model). However, by the middle of the decade competitiveness was on the wane and this, together with the fact that too many customers had been tempted to fit unsuitably heavy coachwork to the excellent chassis rather than accept the expense and complexity of Bentley's 6½-litre 'Silent Six', led to the introduction of the '4½'.
The new 4½-Litre model effectively employed the same chassis, transmission and brakes, combined with an engine that was in essence two-thirds of the six-cylinder 6½-litre unit. Thus the new four-cylinder motor retained the six's 100x140mm bore/stroke and Bentley's familiar four-valves-per-cylinder fixed-'head architecture, but reverted to the reliable front-end vertical camshaft drive.
Bentley Motors lost no time in race-proving its new car. It is believed that the first prototype engine went into the 1927 chassis of the Le Mans practice car. Subsequently this same engine was fitted to the first production 4½-Litre chassis for that year's Grand Prix d'Endurance at the Sarthe circuit. The original 4½-Litre car, nicknamed by the team 'Old Mother Gun' and driven by Frank Clement and Leslie Callingham, promptly set the fastest race lap of 73.41mph before being eliminated in the infamous 'White House Crash' multiple pile-up.
The 4½-Litre was produced for four years, all but nine of the 665 cars made being built on the 10'10" Long Standard, wheelbase chassis. Purchasers of the 4½-Litre model were, in common with those of all vintage-period Bentleys, free to specify their preferences from a very considerable range of mechanical and electrical equipment, in addition to whatever body style and coachbuilder might be required.
This car
is for sale as of September 6, 2018 |
