What’s the first car brand you think of when I say James Bond? Aston Martin, right? Well, what if I told you that, in the original Ian Fleming novels, he had an allegiance to another winged British marque, only one that started with the next letter on the alphabet?
Bentley.
Nowadays a brand associated with Hermes handbags and snooty suits, in its heyday, Bentley built a solid reputation on being a car for the gentleman driver (a term I often read about, but never see in the flesh.) A sporting alternative to the Rolls-Royce, it was definitely the steed for a man like Bond.
Recently, I decided to dive head first into the pile of unread books taking up the entirety of my desk space, starting with Thunderball. Having seen my fair share of Bond films, I was super curious to see how the novels differed from the cinematic adaptions. The answer? I was really surprised to see how deep Fleming dove into the details to craft a deep, immersive lore and plausible backstories for even the most minor of characters.
Moreso, Fleming must have had a mad passion and enthusiasm for cars. Almost every character here seemed to have a penchant for fine automobiles and spirited driving. How many other writers do you know would bother mentioning whenever a character executed a perfect “racing change” – a forgotten, pre-synchronized transmission shifting technique where drivers rev-matched by ear to shift gears without using the clutch?
Here, Bond drives a pretty interesting Bentley of Fleming’s creation, a far different beast from the Aston Martin DB5 that Bond fans know and love. And while trying to look for more information on this Bentley, I found two things: there are no photos of what this car would have looked like in real life, and only recently, one dedicated enthusiast let his intrusive thoughts win and brought it back to life with a one-off special tribute.
Bond’s Bentley in Thunderball
Well, how did the enthusiast in question know where to start with his creation?
Turns out, Ian Fleming left some pretty significant clues, nay, a detailed description of what this fictional Bentley was like:
“Bond had the most selfish car in England. It was a Mark II Continental Bentley that some rich idiot had married to a telegraph pole on the Great West Road. Bond had bought the bits for £1500 and Rolls had straightened the bend in the chassis and fitted new clockwork—the Mark IV engine with 9.5 compression.
Then Bond had gone to Mulliners with £3000, which was half his total capital, and they had sawn off the old cramped sports saloon body and had fitted a trim, rather square convertible two-seater affair, power-operated, with only two large armed bucket seats in black leather. The rest of the blunt end was all knife-edged, rather ugly, trunk.
The car was painted in rough, not gloss, battleship gray and the upholstery was black morocco.
She went like a bird and a bomb and Bond loved her more than all the women at present in his life rolled, if that were feasible, together.
The twin exhausts – Bond had demanded two-inch pipes, he hadn’t liked the old soft flutter of the marque – growled solidly as the long grey nose topped by a big octagonal silver bolt instead of the winged “B” swerved out of the little Chelsea square and into King’s Road.”
It was a car that suited Fleming’s Bond to a T. Brutish elegance, and built for reliable, practical performance rather than class and style.
So, why didn’t the Bentley make it onto the silver screen?
Simply put, that was a production choice. By the time Thunderball hit theaters, Bond had already been established as an Aston man since Goldfinger. The spy drove a DB Mark III in the novel, which was updated to the DB5 for the cinematic adaption – becoming an icon in the process.
Also, I assume it didn’t make financial or logistical sense to build a one-off custom classic Bentley for the purposes of the film, since it didn’t play a major role in the story. Plus, Aston Martin were more than willing to provide the still-in-production DB5 for Thunderball, given the success of Goldfinger.
Thus, Bond’s formidable Bentley Mark II Continental remained a literary legend, known only to those who have ventured beyond the films and into Fleming’s original novels.
The One-Off Custom Tribute: Bringing Bond’s Bentley to Life
Tony Hunter was no stranger to car design, having worked for companies like BMW, Volvo, Jaguar and Land Rover during his career. He also had his hand in designing and creating quite a few movie cars including the Land Rover Defender in Tomb Raider and the Ford Thunderbird FAB 1 in Thunderbirds. Despite his extensive background, one car remained an elusive dream—the Thunderball Bentley, known as The Locomotive.
But his personal hunt for the Bond Bentley hit a snag: nobody had ever recreated the Bentley in real life. So, he had to solve the puzzle with the pieces from all three books it appears in, Thunderball, On Her Majesty’s Secret Service and The Living Daylights.
So, Hunter grabbed the closest production Bentley model, a 1953 Continental R-Type and sent it off to a coachbuilder in Poland, where the build took far longer than the initially projected 18 months. Probably why very few have attempted to recreate the iconic Bond Bentley.
The finished car isn’t a 1:1 replica, but rather a faithful tribute—designed as if Bond himself had commissioned it from Mulliner. Even touches that Bond himself would have probably approved of himself were added, such as bonnet louvres and dual fuel fillers (to prevent dragging the petrol pump hose over the bodywork of the car on cross-continental trips).
And the attention to detail is just crisp. Hidden compartments, a working 1950s RAF bomber telephone wired to an iPhone (just a touch of modernity to make it feasible), and switches labelled in that classic font, Gill Sans for Bond-style gadgets like machine guns, oil slicks and smoke screens Mechanically, it houses a restored Bentley S1 4.9L straight-six paired with a manual gearbox, with a supercharger planned for the future.
This custom Bentley proves that not all of Bond’s best cars made it to the big screen. The Thunderball Bentley may not have been as iconic as the DB5, but thanks to a passionate builder and fan, its legacy lives on.
Would you drive a classic Bentley like Bond’s, or do you prefer the high-tech Astons of the films? Let me know in the comments!
And if you want to see the Bond Bentley in action, here’s a great video from one of my favourite car review channels, Number 27.
