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Video: Building The 2011 Bentley Mulsanne's Body

 
6 2,273 views February 4, 2010

Building the 2011 Bentley Mulsanne

Unveiled at last year's Pebble Beach Concours, the 2011 Bentley Mulsanne is the hyper-luxury car company's latest take on classical elegance. This video details the construction of the car at the new body assembly center in the Crewe, U.K. factory.

Combining modern technology with traditional coachbuilding techniques and the attention to detail that can only come from master crafters and stratospheric price tags, the Bentley Mulsanne requires 125 man-hours to create just the body of pre-production vehicles. Details like the hand-brazed seam on the D-pillar, which hides panel seams to create a smooth, flowing look across the rear of the car, are still done by hand to achieve the optimal result.

Hand-hammering of the body panels is out, however, as the complex shapes of the Mulsanne's front fenders requires the use of superforming, a high-tech process that heats an aluminum sheet to 500 degrees centigrade and molds it to form with air pressure. Check out the video below for a look at the entire process.

[Bentley]


HI-RES GALLERY: Building the 2011 Bentley Mulsanne




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Comments (6)

  1. By bepsf Posted: 2/4/2010 12:29pm PST

    Fascinating video!
    "Details...on the D-pillar..."
    What D Pillar?
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pillar_(car)
     
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  2. Nelson avatar Nelson Ireson Posted: 2/4/2010 2:39pm PST

    Bentley calls it the D-pillar, and I'm not going to argue with them, but I agree: it's more of a C-pillar.
     
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  3. By  cheap r4 Posted: 2/4/2010 7:13pm PST

    I was wondering the same thing, but if you look into the older models, it follows the same design scheme. It then becomes apparent that the folks in Crewe took the design cues from the old S1 when developing this car.
     
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  4. By  My Wheels On Walls Posted: 2/4/2010 8:16pm PST

    Nelson and bepsf- I did some asking around so here is the assumption! That traditional "C" post is huge so essentially the front edge has a support in it so that's the C post and the back edge also has a support in it so that is the "D" post.
    Hopefully that clears things up and yes traditionally posts are seperated by glass and not huge expanses of sheet metal...
     
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  5. fb_608456525 avatar Adrian West Posted: 2/5/2010 6:22am PST

    I might pop in and have a look. It's just round the corner from me ;o)
     
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  6. By l4m34$$ Posted: 2/5/2010 10:01am PST

    Where is part II of the video? I didn't see anybody performing any brazing with their wooden stove powered fire or blowing air through a bellow to form the body panels.
     
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