At first glance, the Mulsanne W.O. Edition by Mulliner doesn’t look out of the ordinary for a special edition of an ultra-luxury sedan. But then you notice a plaque that reads: “Taken from the original engine of W.O’s 8 Litre GK ‘706’.” More to the point, that’s an unfortunate move from the automaker’s part towards its legacy.
But first, who is this W.O. guy? Walter Owen is the name, and as some of you might have guessed by now, he’s Mr. Bentley himself. The founder of the British automaker used to own an 8 Litre that was originally registered as GK 706. After it was bought back by Bentley in 2006, the car underwent a nut-and-bolt restoration.
During the process, the crankshaft was replaced, and slices of the crankshaft in question are “symbolically installed in the new Mulsanne W.O. Edition by Mulliner.” For an automaker that made its fortune and fame through the vision of Walter Owen, selling what was once his private property (and now the legacy of the brand) to people who like to boast with their car collections is daft.
Adding insult to injury, can you imagine what it would be like to explain to a non-car person what the plaque means? Daft is, once again, the word you’re looking for.
Bearing in mind Bentley celebrates its centenary in 2019, does it come as a surprise the Mulsanne W.O. Edition by Mulliner is limited to 100 examples of the breed? For whatever reason, customers can choose the entry-level version of the 6.75-liter twin-turbo V8 (505 horsepower) in favor of the more powerful tune (530 horsepower). And as you would expect, customers are also offered the possibility of having their car in Standard Wheelbase and Extended Wheelbase flavors.
The question is, why does Bentley offer entry-level features on a vehicle that bears the founder’s name and a piece of his car’s crankshaft? It doesn’t make sense at all to people who know better, let alone to Walter Owen if he were to be alive today.
After a 1:43 scale model of a Ferrari 250 GTO sparked Mircea's interest for cars when he was a kid, an early internship at Top Gear sealed his career path. He's most interested in muscle cars and American trucks, but he takes a passing interest in quirky kei cars as well. Full profile
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