Bentley Officially Announces Arnage Replacement, Teaser Campaign Begins

THE REPLACEMENT for Bentley's stately Arnage has been a long time coming, but the British luxury carmaker has today announced that its replacement is just around the corner.

Bentley says the new range-topper will be, " an all-new Bentley, positioned at the very pinnacle of the market".

That's a pretty clear indication that instead of playing second fiddle to the Rolls Royce Phantom (as the Arnage has since the Phantom's launch), the company from Crewe will be bumping things up a notch and wheeling out a car that surpasses all existing uber-luxury saloons.

It will, as Bentley says, be "The epitome of Bentley".

That much is certain, but what isn't known is what the car looks like, what powers it and indeed, what it will be named. Over the next few weeks Bentley will slowly leak out information on the all-new Bentley (referred to by the company as the "Grand Bentley"), before revealing it in its entirety.

The teaser shot above is the only image released thus far, and aside from telling us that the new car will flaunt some unmistakeably Bentley-ish design cues, there's not a whole lot else that we can discern from it. What we can say though, is that we can expect to see something completely different under the bonnet.

While the current Arnage isn't terribly long in the tooth, the engine that powers it certainly is. Bentley's V8 is 50 years old this year, and thanks to ever-more-stringent emissions regulations (and atrocious fuel economy),  it'll be put out to pasture along with the Arnage.

With the new car, an all-new engine will feature. Bentley hinted at it last month, and it will be flex-fuel capable and use up to 40 percent less fuel than the Arnage's 6.75 litre twin-turbocharged V8.

As to what architecture it will be built on, how many cylinders it will deploy and whether it will use forced-induction or be naturally aspirated, all that will be revealed in due course.

Until then, you can check out Bentley's teaser site here. Stay tuned, we'll be bringing you more shortly.