Bentley Speed 8 Price Guide

The Bentley Speed Eight is not a factory model and never was (the Speed 8 was the race-car they won the 2003 edition of Le Mans with, but that’s a different tale altogether). What the ‘Speed Eight’ is instead is something interesting: a bespoke tribute car built to the highest possible standard by Racing Green Engineering of the UK, evoking the spirit and appearance of the Bentley Boys era without the fragility, inaccessibility, and eight-figure price tag of a genuine 1920s or 1930s racing Bentley.

What It Is

Racing Green Engineering builds Speed Eights on the basis of fully restored and structurally strengthened Bentley Mark VI or early R Type chassis from the late 1940s and early 1950s; genuine Crewe-built foundations with proper Bentley provenance. These are mated to Rolls-Royce B-series eight-cylinder engines: typically the B80 5.6-litre straight-eight or the B81 6.5-litre variant, both derived from military and commercial Rolls-Royce units that were never fitted to standard production Bentley road cars but are entirely period-appropriate in character and construction. The body is built in the traditional manner (ash wood frame, hand-formed aluminium panels) in a style that echoes the open Le Mans tourers and Vanden Plas coachwork of the Bentley Boys period. Each car takes hundreds of hours to complete. No two are identical.

The Driving Experience

A Speed Eight drives very differently from an original 1920s Bentley. The Mark VI chassis brings hydraulic brakes, a fully synchronised four-speed gearbox, and a rigidity that pre-war chassis cannot match. The B-series straight-eight produces a deep, unhurried torque that makes the car genuinely usable on modern roads without the constant mechanical attention that an original W.O.-era car demands. Compared to a genuine 3 Litre or Speed Six, a Speed Eight is dramatically easier to drive, more reliable in everyday use, and vastly cheaper to run, all while still producing the evocative exhaust note and visual drama that the originals provide.

Buying

Each Speed Eight is effectively unique, so buying one requires assessing the individual car rather than applying a standard specification checklist. The key questions are: which chassis is it based on, and what is its documented history? What engine,B80 or B81, and what is its service history? Who built the body, and how many hours went into it? Racing Green Engineering will provide build documentation for their own cars. The quality of bodywork and interior finish varies between different builders and different commissions; inspect the timber framing, aluminium joints, and leather work carefully.

Values depend entirely on specification and provenance. A Racing Green Engineering car on a well-documented chassis with the larger B81 engine will command substantially more than an anonymous build with an uncertain history. Do not conflate a Speed Eight with a genuine W.O.-era Bentley as the two occupy entirely different markets and the Speed Eight makes no pretence at being otherwise. It is a modern craftsman’s interpretation of a legendary era, and for many buyers that is precisely what they want: the experience of a Bentley Boys car without the complications of owning the real thing. The Bentley Drivers Club can provide guidance on chassis verification and the broader community of pre-war and tribute Bentley enthusiasts.