2013 Bentley Flying Spur
Extensively revised luxury saloon to debut at Geneva Show
By Shahzad Sheikh
The Bentley Flying Spur has been extensively updated for 2013 with this new generation model that will debut at the Geneva Motor Show next month. Whilst the face remains familiar, it’s completely new with a bigger more upright and forward jutting grill, larger lights and a softening of the side edges.
Flying Spur has a much more fluted and curvy side profile too with swage lines that taper into a less bulkier rear which nonetheless features more muscular and substantial wheelarches – a neat visual trick. Most radical of all is the tail of the car which eschews the ample mass of the old car – a throwback to earlier cars – for a much sleeker, slimmer and modern look.
The roof line is lower and there’s a new wing vent on the front fenders with a nicely integrated ‘B’ motif.
Overall the new car retains presence, style and grace, but to my eyes at least, is a much more desirable and appealing car and makes the old FS look dated and slab-sided – surprising given that it’s much harder to distinguish between the new Continental GT Coupes and their predecessors.
Inside, things will be much more familiar and far less radical where the focus has been on enhancing the quality (there’s 600 new parts) and electrickery rather than overhauling the look. It’s available as a four or five seater with heated and cooled seats.
It’s getting techy too with an 8-inch touch screen, Bluetoothery, Naim sound system with 1100 Watts of power with full connectivity. Rear entertainment with 64GB of storage and two 10-inch rear screens – the car even has its own Wi-Fi hotspot through a SIM card.
Under the bonnet is a familiar 6.0-litre twin-turbo 48-valve W12 with 616bhp and 580lb ft of torque from only 2000rpm mated to an eight-speed ZF auto. It will do 0-100kph in 4.6secs and hit 322kph.
The front and the rear doesn’t quite sync that well. The rear should have featured twin tail light clusters at each end.