Models Covered:
(4 dr saloon 4.4 6.7 petrol [base, Green Label, Red Label] )
BY ANDY ENRIGHT
Imagine yourself behind the wheel of a Bentley Arnage, feet lost somewhere in the carpeting, the big V8 engine up ahead sounding like distant rolling thunder. This isn’t a car, this is an occasion, a force of nature beyond all but the super wealthy. With used Arnages now starting to crop up, is this experience beyond the bounds of reality or can the Bentley really make some sort of sense? Attempting to justify a purchase like this on any grounds other than the emotional is ridiculous, so sit back and enjoy the ride.
On 26th April 1998 the Arnage was unveiled to the public at the Sarthe Circuit in France. Bentley Motors Ltd. couldn't have chosen a more appropriate location. This was the racecourse which had seen Bentleys finishing first in the famous "24 Hours of Le Mans" no less than five times during their glorious past. The renaissance of Bentley as an independent marque had started with the Bentley Mulsanne – a name taken from the Le Mans race circuit. The Bentley Arnage took its name from the challenging bend at the famous track.
The car initially appalled old-school Bentley purists by ditching the traditional 6750cc V8 engine and instead opting for a 4.4-litre turbocharged V8 engine from BMW. Yes, the company that delivered the near-implosion of the Rover Group was powering not only the Rolls-Royce Silver Seraph, but the Bentley Arnage too. Truth be told, the BMW engine fitted to the Bentley was an excellent unit, delivering huge amounts of torque and power. It just didn’t rest easily with Bentley aficionados.
This was rectified in September 1999, when the Volkswagen Group, Bentley’s parent company, backtracked and offered the monster Rolls-Royce 6.8-litre V8 in a new version of the Arnage. The BMW-powered car was designated the Green Label, whilst the ‘proper’ Rolls-Royce engined model was titled the Red Label. When you’re charging over £140,000 for your product, you just know it has to wear the right label. Model year 2000 cars were fitted with more powerful brakes and the Green Label model gained the 18-inch wheels sported by the more powerful Red Label variant. Shortly afterwards the Green Label was quietly dropped and in 2002 the Series II Arnage was introduced, first with the thundering Arnage T and then the revised Red Label.
The Arnage model received a few detail changes when the Green/Red Label models were announced. Some of the handling tweaks worked into the Red Label have been included in diluted form on the Green Label model, which also gets new-style wheels and clear indicator lenses. Inside both cars, a careful repackaging has liberated an extra two inches of rear legroom and an inch more rear headroom. There’s more space for feet too, courtesy of reshaped seat backs and a lowered floor. The comprehensive equipment levels remain much as before though radar parking sensors and a discreetly packaged satellite navigation system are now standard.
Perhaps more important than any of this, however, is the Arnage’s undisputed status as the only true sporting Bentley of the modern era. The old Turbo R and Brooklands models pretended to be of course, but in truth were little more than re-badged Rolls-Royces. This car is different. Very different. True, it shares much with its stablemate, the V12 BMW-engined Rolls-Royce Silver Seraph – not least stylist Grahams Hull’s smooth, yet stately new lines. A few subtle styling tweaks – and one not so subtle one (the deletion of the Rolls Royce’s huge ‘Greek temple’ front grille) – make all the difference however. Somehow, the Bentley feels a much smaller car; perhaps because of the way the bonnet drops away in front of you, uncluttered by the Spirit of Ecstasy emblems. It’s an impression that should continue on the road, where the car seems to shrink around you. Grappling with the steering in one of the old models could seem like trying to direct a Channel ferry in a choppy sea. The steering precision of the latest Arnage, in contrast, is a revelation, allowing you to place the car just where you want it. W.O. Bentley would have approved.
Inside the cabin, as we’ve suggested, there’s everything you’d expect – as well as a few things you wouldn’t. Fear not, beautiful wood veneer and walnut abound and glorious anachronisms like the dashboard-mounted ignition switch and the ‘organ stop’ air vents still remain. Sitting less comfortably in all this opulence is the BMW-sourced digital air conditioning system which looks out of place in such a car as this. Never mind. Behind the wheel, you still sink your shoes ankle-deep into something which seems more like an entire sheep than a mere carpet. All around you, there’s craftsmanship that would send the Antiques Roadshow Team into sheer ecstasy. Anything that couldn’t be veneered has been chromed; switches, door handles, ashtrays, air vents; only the obscenely fat column stalk that now controls the wipers (the switch used to be endearingly on the dash) is a reminder that this is now a car of the 20th Century.
As ever in a Bentley, you sit high up, with a commanding view of the proletariat who remain mightily impressed by that enormous front grille, even if it doesn’t have a Spirit of Ecstasy statue astride it. After a few miles, you won’t care that this car still has the drag co-efficient of a garden shed. All that matters is that behind that endless bonnet, you’ll have paid handsomely for this kind of superiority complex, so you might as well enjoy it.
You’d never expect a Bentley to be inexpensive and the Arnage doesn’t disappoint. The early Arnage models with the 4.4-litre V8 are appearing in comparatively steady numbers, and prices for these start at around £48,000 depending on specification, mileage and condition. A low mileage 1999 Arnage 4.4 retails for around £50,000-£53,000, which whilst hardly representing loose change still represents a considerable saving on new. Used prices for the mighty Red Label model are still in the region of £54,000 for a 1999 model, and £80,000 for a pristine early 2002 car. Insurance? If you have to ask you probably couldn’t afford it, but to the rest of us – Group 20.
Think of the Arnage as a fusion of the best Volkswagen and BMW can offer with a traditional British flavour and you’d be quite near the mark. Therefore it should come as no surprise that the Bentley has proved mechanically very reliable. It pays dividends to make sure that your prospective purchase has all of the fittings and fixtures intact and the trim is in perfect condition, as these sorts of small cosmetic faults are often enough to put off prospective purchasers and knock values severely. Also check the condition of the rear tyres. The Arnage’s sporty handling characteristics and power/weight mean that enthusiastic driving can easily have a pair of £400 rear tyres waving the white flag in very short order. Otherwise, always look for main or specialist dealer servicing and buy with confidence.
(approx based on a 1998 Arnage 4.4) Bentley spares prices certainly aren’t cheap, although they are only slightly more than a number of far more prosaic manufacturers. The famed durability of Bentleys should also offset the cost of parts. A new radiator for an Arnage is in the region of £450, whilst a starter motor retails at around £315. A new alternator will be £395 and if a headlamp takes a parking knock, a new unit will be around £400.
The Arnage is the first of the new generation of sporting Bentleys. Yes it may weigh as much as some people’s houses, but all models boast massive reserves of power and a surprisingly sporty chassis and suspension set up. Indeed when the Arnage is worked hard, it doesn’t so much shrink around the driver as remind him of a BMW M5 with a gentleman’s club makeover. Sure, the Daimler Super V8 does the same job for conspicuously less, but that’s missing the point. It’s not a Bentley.
Whichever Arnage you choose, you’ll be purchasing an astonishingly impressive car. Even in Green Label form, it feels very powerful, with twin turbochargers urging this huge car to sixty in just 6.2s on the way to an artificially limited maximum speed of 150mph. For the Red Label, the respective figures are 5.9s and 155mph. Both models have great mid-range pulling power too – and crucially, superb levels of refinement. Most of the time, you’ll be content to glide from county to county, much as the standard five-speed automatic gearbox slides imperceptibly from ratio to ratio. You can hear the engine all right, but it sounds magnificent; like a distant artillery bombardment. And talking of loud noises now muffled, changes to the suspension, allied to a much more rigid body also improved the ride of the Green/Red Label models over the earlier Arnage 4.4. Where the old model crashed through potholes, the newer cars waft over them. Run your Bentley Arnage Red Label for 12,000 miles and you can kiss the environmental conscience goodbye. As well as costing you approximately £4,000 in fuel, you’ll also pump nearly nine tonnes of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Just think what global warming’s going to do to the snow conditions in Gstaad…
The Bentley Arnage is the finest product ever to come out of the Crewe. Bang up to date where it needs to be and reassuringly anachronistic in other areas, it’s mightily impressive. A few details may jar, and many won’t like the idea of a BMW engine powering a British motoring icon. For these the Red Label model will appease their jingoism, but whichever Arnage is chosen, it’s a great used purchase. Just thinking about the saving you’ve made will put a huge smile on your face and piloting the Arnage through a series of sweeping bends will keep it there. Do your sums first and establish whether you can afford to run it properly and the smile won’t fade. If you think it’s touch and go, buy an older Bentley Mulsanne instead. Just don’t ever accept an offer to drive an Arnage. It may have a Seraph’s body but you’d sell your soul to own one.