Rolls Royce
Henry Royce, the engineer who had started building cars, and the Rt. Hon. Charles Rolls the car mad racer with an existing car dealership, set up in partnership together as Rolls-Royce. Royce settled on the 40/50 6 cylinder called the Silver Ghost. Rolls, who was one of the pioneer aviators, tragically died during the Bourmouth airshow of 1910 when the tail of his aeroplane broke off. After the first war a small car was added to the Rolls Royce range to help ensure the company would have full order books with a smaller more affordable car known as the 20hp, and this policy was kept going as the 20hp evolved into the 20/25 (in 1929), 25/30 (in 1936) and Wraith in 1939. Meanwhile the Silver Ghost was replaced in 1925 by the New Phantom (Phantom 1), followed by Phantom 2 in 1925 and the V12 Phantom 3 in 1935.
Postwar and in 1946 the Silver Wraith was introduced, which became 4.9 litres in 1948. The standard steel bodied Silver Dawn of 1951 was virtually identical to the Bentley, after which came the Silver Cloud range during which time the 6.2 litre V8 was introduced in the Silver Cloud2 and Silver Cloud 3 from 1962 to 1965. The Silver Shadow range followed, increasing in capacity to 6750cc in 1970.
