Bentley SUV to get W12 engine

Bentley boss Wolfgang Dürheimer has said the planned Bentley SUV will offer a W12 engine to show that the Bentley SUV is ‘The Boss’.

Back in July we had the talkative Bentley boss Wolfgang Dürheimer musing that Bentley will produce the ultimate luxury SUV, with plans to take the underpinnings from sister company Porsche’s Cayenne and make the most opulent SUV on the planet.

The plan for a Bentley SUV has been around for a while, but the perception by car makers that big SUVs were unpalatable to the general public in these eco-obsessed times meant plans by many car makers to build an SUV were left to gather dust on the shelves.

But those car makers who chose to ignore the brickbats directed at big SUVs have proved that there is big demand for luxury monsters (the Cayenne has turned in to Porsche’s biggest cash cow) and that the anti-SUV lobby was simply a very small bunch of eco-mentalists making headlines.

So Bentley are now committed to producing an SUV, and it looks as if they’re willing to throw all their biggest toys in to the SUV pot with Wolfgang Dürheimer telling Autocar the Bentley SUV will come complete with Bentley’s W12 engine to “make it clear whose car is the boss”. Fair enough.

But despite Herr Dürheimer’s assertion that any Bentley SUV will be offered with Bentley’s W12, it seems likely there will also be an SUV offered with the new Audi/Bentley V8 as a ‘Sporty’ SUV option, so you can take your pick from a cosseting and serene Bentley SUV with a W12 or a rather more raunchy version with stiffer suspension for a luxury Cayenne Turbo alternative.

But whichever Bentley SUV you opt for, there won’t be much change from £200k.