Bentley Arnage Red Label & Mercedes SL73 AMG (R129) - MotorVision

BENTLEY ARNAGE RED LABEL

The revised version of the car was launched as the Arnage Red Label in October 1999. At the same time, but without fanfare, Bentley made several minor modifications to the original BMW engined cars, and designated them as the "Arnage Green Label" for the 2000 model year. The most important modifications, to both Red and Green Label cars, gave them stiffer body-shells, and larger wheels and brakes. Both the stiffer body-shells and the larger brakes were necessitated by the extra heft of the large old British engine.[6] Despite the larger brakes, braking performance worsened with the extra weight of the 6.75 engine. The braking performance of the 1999 Green Label from 113–0 km/h was 172 feet (52 m) while the later Arnage T's performance was 182 feet (55 m) from the same speed.[7][8]

Revisions included:

Standard Alpine pop up navigation system.
Park distance control to the front and rear.
Increased rear seat leg room (by modifying the design of the front seatbacks).
Power folding exterior mirrors.
Modifications to the steering rack to reduce steering effort at low speeds.

The glass headlight lens covers (1998–99) were revised to plastic (2000 on).

Bentley cited customer demand as driving the reversion to the old two valve per cylinder 6.75-litre unit for the Red Label.

In reality, the outgoing BMW-powered Arnage was technically more modern, considerably more fuel efficient, and had 32 valves with double overhead camshafts, twin-turbochargers and Bosch engine management technology – as opposed to the 16-valve, single turbocharger and a pushrod engine with less advanced engine management.[6] The Red Label's increase in motive power shaved less than a second of the 0 to 97 km/h (60 mph) acceleration time. However, the BMW twin-turbocharged unit remained noticeably more agile and responsive from a driver's perspective, due to its more responsive character, better weight balance (maintaining a 51.1/48.9 weight distribution)[7] and almost 272 kg (600 lb) lower curb weight. Ultimately the Green Label was more reliable and significantly less expensive to service in the long term.[9][10] The key limiting factor of the BMW engine's output was the ZF 5HP30 transmission which was not rated to handle more than the 560 N⋅m (413 lb⋅ft) of torque that the twin-turbocharged engine was tuned to produce.

Vickers had outsourced the production of the old 6.75-litre Rolls-Royce engine for use in the contemporary Continental R and Azure models to Cosworth, so reverting to the old standby engine was a natural choice for the company.

The Red Label model reverted to the old V8 engine, which boasted torque of 835 N⋅m (616 lbf⋅ft) with a single Garrett T4 turbocharger. This was the greatest amount of torque for a four-door car at the time. Also returning was the General Motors-sourced four-speed 4L80-E automatic transmission.

MERCEDES SL73 AMG

M297 7.3 V12 (525 hp/750 lbf·ft)

SL 73 AMG was offered with the new M297 engine 7.3 litres (7,291 cc) from 1997 to 2001, with a bore x stroke of 91.5 mm × 92.4 mm (3.60 in × 3.64 in) DOHC 4 valves per cylinder, fuel fed by naturally aspirated Bosch HFM fuel injection and a compression ratio of 10.5:1, producing 386 kW (525 PS; 518 bhp)[5] at 5,500 rpm and 750 N⋅m (553 lbf⋅ft) at 4,000 rpm of torque,[13] which was later used also by Pagani in the Zonda, enabling the SL 73 to set off from 0 to 100 km/h (62 mph) in no longer than 4.5 seconds, while achieving a top speed of above-320 km/h (199 mph). Only 85 cars were made.

The M297 is based on the M120 engine but has been tuned by AMG for use in high-performance sports cars. It was offered as a 6.9 L (6,898 cc) version with a bore and stroke of 89 mm × 92.4 mm (3.50 in × 3.64 in), respectively, and was only available in the road-legal version of the CLK GTR.[1] A 7.3 L (7,291 cc) unit was also available featuring a larger bore of 91.5 mm (3.60 in), and was used in Pagani Zonda models until 2016


‎@RetroCarReviews

RETRO CAR REVIEW'S & ROAD TEST'S

#amg #r129