Bentley crafts mechanical artwork for Prince's Trust charity auction
Most of us will never own an ultraluxury car such as a Bentley, but for a slightly lesser price you can still have something built in Crewe.
Bentley Motors and its employees from the tooling, woodshop and styling departments have created a range of collector items the will cross the auction block to raise funds for the Prince's Trust charity. The items include Bentley artwork, a chess set and Bentley camshaft lamps.
"The design brief for the auction," said Bentley board member Michael Straughan, "was to create unique and desirable items based upon the core materials, parts and processes that are used to build cars such as the Mulsanne and Continental GT."
The Prince's Trust is a youth charity that provides practical and financial support for 14-to-30-year-olds who have struggled at school, are long-term unemployed or who have been in trouble with the law. The charity claims to have helped more than 600,000 young people gain workplace skills since 1976.
About 20 Bentley pieces have been commissioned; all of them except the cutlery set were designed in and built at the Bentley factory. The auction will be hosted online at www.bentleybespokeauction.com, with bidding opening on Sept. 1.
Audi twin-turbo 4.0-liter V8: In Depth
We're eagerly awaiting the chance to see the S lineup in Frankfurt but, in the meantime, Audi has released new details about the twin-turbo 4.0-liter V8 engine.
Jointly developed with Bentley, the aluminum-intensive mill has classic 90 degree cylinder banks, a charge-air intercooler and an advanced exhaust system. These are nice touches, but the real story is "cylinder on demand" technology which deactivates four-cylinders when maximum performance isn't required. Audi estimates this improves fuel efficiency by up to 5%, while reducing emissions 10 to 12 g/km. If that isn't impressive enough, there's also a start/stop system which cuts CO2 emissions by as much as 24 g/km.
To reduce NVH (noise, vibration and harshness), the engine sits on active mounts which detect vibrations and uses a counter-vibration to limit engine movement. Likewise, the active noise control system uses four microphones to detect "disturbing constituents" in the cabin and eliminate them by sending an opposing sound through the speakers.
