Bentley Continental GTC

ORNAMENTAL CONTINENTAL
Bentley’s Stunning Continental GTC Just Can’t Fail. Andy Enright Explains Why

By all received wisdom, a convertible car should be a thing of beauty. It should evoke the emotions, look as if it’s travelling at full tilt even when stationary and induce the desire to drive through France at high speed and leisurely cruise along the road from Monaco to Cannes. Reading newspaper at chic pavement cafes, staying in places where the valets fight over who get to park you car and living high on the hog until your credit card goes pop, that’s what a truly successful convertible should make you want to do. Most don’t. Most drop tops are rather unsuccessful hack jobs of existing saloons or coupes. Here’s one that isn’t. It’s a luxury convertible that has a certain old school raffishness about it but which is built on relentlessly high-tech underpinnings. The Bentley Continental GTC is, for the time being at least, about as good as convertibles get.

After all, when you’re paying this much for a car, it’s 90 per cent what the car says about you and makes you feel and 10 per cent what it actually does. For those that fixate on diminishing returns, here’s what the GTC can do. It will accelerate from a standing start to 60mph in an eyeball-popping 4.8 seconds and the 552bhp twin-turbocharged 6.0-lite W12 engine will keep accelerating right up to a heady 195mph. Unless you want to experience an accelerated course of male pattern baldness, you’ll need to have the roof up at these speeds but you probably didn’t need me to tell you that. The full 650Nm slug of torque is available from as little as 1.600rpm which means that the Continental GTC is as effortless to drive as its coupe sibling. If you’re concerned about fuel economy and emissions, buy something else. No excuses required here. With the security of four-wheel drive and a whole panoply of safety features, the Continental GTC is as reassuring as it is rapid.

It’s also extremely beautiful. I must admit to not being wholly sold on the styling of either the Continental GT coupe or the Flying Spur saloon, but the drop top is a breathtaking piece of design. The stance of the car looks quite different to the coupe, especially when the hood is raised. With a low turret look effected by a small glasshouse, the GTC looks poised and cohesive. Drop the roof and it looks even better. A stainless steel ring runs around the whole cabin and the longer rear deck looks neatly composed. Bentley have striven to avoid the large number of shutlines and creases that are often part and parcel of packaging a convertible roof and the rear of the GTC is extremely clean.

"Bentley have fused tradition and technology in a beautifully elegant manner with the Continetal GTC convertible"

The hood itself deserves a mention. Although it’s not the quickest folding mechanism around at 25 seconds from roof up to roof down, it’s nevertheless a beautiful piece of craftsmanship. With seven bows to preserve stiffness, it features a triple lined fabric construction to ensure the best acoustic and thermal insulation properties. The outer layer is thicker than that of any convertible while the middle insulating layer is also a good deal thicker than the entire roof sections of moist drop tops. The inner layer is made from high quality cloth which echoes the roof lining of Bentleys from yesteryear. Even during the operation of the roof, not one mechanical part is visible. A heated glass rear window is a necessity and there’s even an interior light incorporated into the headlining. A neat convenience feature is that the roof can be operated even after pulling away at speeds of up to 20mph, so there’s not that anxiety you often get when attempting to operate a soft top in a traffic light queue.

The GTC is so much more than a Continental GT that’s had an angle grinder taken to it. Designed alongside the coupe model, the GTC features a different rear suspension design. Although the basic trapezoidal multi-link arrangement is much the same, the air dampers have needed to be positioned lower and are now attached to a new trapezoidal link. The rates for the air springs and damper hydraulics have also been revised to give a more yielding ride on the softest of the four pre-programmed suspension settings that run from Comfort through to Sport.

Power is transmitted to the road via a rear-biased four-wheel drive set up which gives the Continental GTC a handy advantage when the going gets slippery. The link between the driven wheels and the engine comes courtesy of a six-speed automatic transmission built for Bentley by ZF. This can be marshaled via paddles behind the steering wheel should you wish, or else it can be driven like a conventional automatic. This was a surprisingly controversial feature, with some engineers arguing that a car with this much torque didn’t need a six-speed gearbox. Yes, you could lock the Continental GTC into third gear and surf languidly along for much of the time, but the enthusiast owner profile eventually dictated the six ratios.

The Continental GTC benefits from the expertise of the best aerodynamicists the Volkswagen Group had and the venturi tunnel under the rear of the car and the cooling ducts in the engine bay all attest to their labours. The interior is demonstrably Bentley with acres of leather and wood veneers. The fascia has been designed with a notion of symmetry, the centre console rising up to divide two swathes of veneer that were designed to resemble the Bentley winged logo. The Continental GTC is a proper four seater, the backs of the front seats having been scooped out to offer additional knee room for rear passengers.

Certain Bentley trademarks endure – the bullseye chromed ventilation outlets and the organ stop controls, but don’t get the impression that this interior is a quaint retro pastiche. A touch screen LCD display on the centre console controls the air conditioning, satellite navigation, computer information and entertainment systems, whilst many of the minor controls can be operated without removing hands from the steering wheel. It’s this blend of old and new that’s particularly fascinating.

Craftsmanship techniques have been similarly updated. For instance, wood paneling can be dramatically curved in a way that was once impossible. By the same token, while the leather is still applied to the car with the same hand crafted care, it‘s cut from hides using a digitized process that reduces waste and optimizes efficiency.

We may have worried when the Volkswagen Group acquired Bentley in 1998 but only the most jingoistic could grouse at their stewardship of the marque. The Continental GTC is the most attractive convertible Bentley in living memory and will doubtless sell strongly in key markets such as the US, the Far East and Europe. It’s a convertible in the best tradition, a true convertible, a Bentley convertible.