We've talked about John Cobb's "Railton Special" before. The 28' long, twin 12-cylinder beast of a British land speed car was running north of 330mph as early as 1947. Records fell like trees in an Au... <BR><BR>To read the rest of this blog entry from The Jalopy Journal, click here.
Ultimate description of 40's "Slippery".....what a cool piece of machinery.....makes a person want to go out to Bonneville
That thing was hauling ass!!! For a second when they picked up the body I thought they were carrying the car I was thinking "wow that thing is light!!!" Oops! Cool footage, thanks.
Being only a few months old at the time I have forgotten a few of the details. I am guessing twin Rolls-Merlin's to make it go? Tech shots would be fun to look at, though I suspect all of that info was closely guarded information.
Back in the 50's I had a tiny 2.5" model of that car,that came in a cereal box. I looked for years for another. Recently I found 4 on E-bay to add to my huge cereal premium collection. Its too bad no one cares about my collection other than me.
BEAUTIFUL!..............RC...........hard to believe they were doing that in such a beautiful machine the year I was born! Had to laugh when they put the body on, we did exactly the same maneuver just a few days ago to put the body on a '32 two door sedan......some things remain the same 64 years later!.....LOL.........Oh.....the music is excellent also!.........thanks for doing that!
Ryan - Cool video! ... Thanks for sharing! Thanks also for the link to your previous Blog about the Railton Special (I somehow missed that one) ... there's lot's of good info & pics in the resultant Railton Special thread.
Those British LSR cars were almost allways giants compared to the 'liners American hot rodders were building!!! Compare the Railton to Challenger, or the original Green Monster to Bluebird Proteus, the Brits were big on engines and size!!!
For folks that have trouble playing clips, here's a version of the film ... without Ryan's cool soundtrack: <object width="640" height="480"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/pp_LGPxblnM?version=3&hl=en_US"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/pp_LGPxblnM?version=3&hl=en_US" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="640" height="480" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object> Uploaded to YouTube on Mar 31, 2009 by the J. Willard Marriott Library
Very cool - thanks Ryan - John Cobb was my boyhood hero. I remember like yesterday the shock of reading the paper when he was killed in the boat. Pity we have no sound of twin Lions at full throttle! No the car is not that big, it's very low to the ground. You can visit it - I think it's in the National Motor Museum along with the Golden Arrow, also Napier powered.
Just came back from the salt. Funny how much things haven't changed in my lifetime! Still something everyone should experience. Thanks for the great look at how it was done.
Incredible. Thanks for sharing that fantastic historic footage of Jon Cobb on the salt. That film clip is a real treasure. Great choice of music too, Ryan you are the truly a young man with a huge heart and a great love for all things old and nostalgic. Bart
The Railton Special is displayed in the 'Think Tank' Science museum in Birmingham England. Unfortunately thoughts are that it is now too fragile to ever turn a wheel under its own power again. I think they're wrong. With comitment and effort it would fix, but you gotta get past the museum brigade.
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