Launched at the 1985 Geneva Motor Show, the Turbo R was the model that re-established Bentley as a distinct driver-focused marque after two decades as Rolls-Royce's badge-engineered sibling. Where the 1982 Mulsanne Turbo simply added a Garrett T04 turbocharger to the Silver Spirit floorpan, the Turbo R paired that engine with 'Roadholding' suspension: wider tyres, stiffer bushings, uprated dampers and a proper Panhard rod. It was the first modern Bentley engineered to be driven hard.
Over a twelve-year run, Crewe built 7,230 Turbo Rs across short- and long-wheelbase saloons (Wikipedia infobox; motor-car.net; corroborated by Conceptcarz, Classic Driver and Historics lot listings). The 1989 model year introduced fuel injection (K-Motronic, replacing the Solex 4A1 carburettor); 1995 brought the 'New Turbo R' with Zytek EMS3 engine management and modest interior updates; the short-wheelbase body was discontinued for 1996, leaving the LWB as the sole survivor and re-badged simply 'Turbo R'. The 60-car Turbo S of 1994–95 and the six-car Hooper Empress II coachbuilt coupes of 1990–91 sit above the standard cars as the family's genuine collector pieces. The 1997–99 Turbo RT and 56-car RT Mulliner are strictly speaking runout models that outlived the Turbo R nameplate, but every serious buyer's guide covers them together — they are included here for completeness.
Production reconciliation: Wikipedia's four core body-style figures — Original SWB 4,653 + Original LWB 1,211 + New SWB 543 + New LWB 823 — sum to exactly 7,230, matching the family total. The Turbo S (60), Hooper Empress II (5–6), Turbo R SE (12) and Turbo R James Young (6) are all built on those same SWB or LWB chassis and are counted within the four core figures, not added on top. The Turbo RT and RT Mulliner (252 and 56 respectively per Wikipedia) sit outside the 7,230 as a separate 1997–99 runout series after the Turbo R nameplate was retired. RRSilverSpirit's competing 4,458 SWB / 1,524 LWB figures do not reconcile arithmetically with the 7,230 family total (they leave a 195-unit shortfall on SWB and an unexplained surplus on LWB) and are treated here as the Verify alternative rather than the primary.
The Turbo R is the model that separated Bentley from Rolls-Royce commercially, editorially and in the collector market — the first post-war Bentley whose specification, chassis tuning and marketing were engineered for a different customer to the equivalent Silver Spirit. It is also the last of the 'old' Crewe cars, hand-built with body-on-frame construction, real veneers and a 6.75L pushrod V8 that traces its lineage to 1959. Values remain a fraction of the Continental R coupes that followed, but the connoisseur cars — Turbo S, Empress II, RT Mulliner — are already trading independently of the standard-saloon curve.