Rolls-Royce – Bentley L Series V8 engine

The Crewe built Rolls-Royce – Bentley L Series V8 engine was introduced 1959 and is still in production. It was used on most Rolls-Royce and Bentley motor cars in the four decades after its introduction and is still used in the Bentley Mulsanne.

With BMW's acquisition of the rights to use the Rolls Royce name in 1998, Rolls-Royce Motor Cars began using BMW supplied V12 engines but Bentley Motors Limited under Volkswagen ownership continued to use highly modified versions of the L Series on its Bentley Arnage, Bentley Brooklands and Bentley Mulsanne models, with VAG W-12 engines being used in its Bentley Flying Spur and Bentley Continental models.

United States firm Marmon developed the first engine of V8 configuration in 1904, though it was experimental and did not find its way into a passenger vehicle. Rolls-Royce premiered the world's second V8 engine in 1905 for their eponymous Rolls-Royce V-8 Legalimit - so named due to its being governed so as not to exceed the legal speed limit in Britain at the time of 20 miles per hour (32.2 km/h). Production of this engine predated by a decade Cadillac's first mass production of a V8-engined automobile. The 1905 Rolls-Royce V8 was not a success, with only three made and just one sold, which was soon returned to the factory to be scrapped.

Rolls-Royce acquired Bentley in 1931 and continued to use Bentley engines alongside their own for a time, although none was a V8. Prior to World War 2, Rolls-Royce had developed a 7.3-litre V-12 for the Phantom III, which was succeeded by the inlet-over-exhaust B60 straight-6 and B80 straight-8 series of engines. The B80 powered the Phantom IV limousine, whilst the 4.3-litre B60 was used until 1955 to power the Rolls-Royce Silver Wraith and Silver Dawn and the Bentley Mark VI. The B60's bore was enlarged in 1955, increasing the displacement to 4.9 litres, that engine being known as the B61.

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