I thought some of you might find this interesting. Finished eating lunch and was leaving the restaurant, saw this parked on the lot and decided to take some pictures. Looks to be well traveled
Those seats horrified me until i read that sign on the rear, now those seats look nice and comfy with good reason.
In those days the most Rolls woukld have supplied was the radiator shell, hood, and cowl. You bought a chassis from Rolls and had a body built for it by the body builder of your choice. It was the same for may other high end cars at that time.
Judging by the signage, it's purpose built for the "Peking to Paris" and other such vintage car cross-country and cross-continental rallies. This particular "truck" is certainly based on a Silver Ghost chassis, and most likely started life as one of these: unless the cowl was changed, it certainly started life as an open car (touring or roadster)...most likely bodied by Barker or Springfield.
The body was built specifically for the Paris Peking , I think by a company in the UK (A J glue) and the original body stored for later restoration . Rolls did not supply the cowl , you got bulkhead , bonnet and radiator shell from the factory
Great car - I'm kicking around the idea of driving from Liverpool to Shanghai in a couple of years from now and I'd love to do it in that!
KFC is spot on. I worked for RR for many years, Having traveled to Crewe for training many times, I have NEVER seen such quality work as I did when I was at Mulliner Park Ward. Last of the real coach builders. Keith
Looks like it was most likely a Springfield ghost ( us factory) so 1921 onwards they did have standardized body styles aand those ugly lights
Notice the red letters on the rad shell. There are a few different stories about when and why it was changed to black. I think I've only seen one red RR emblem in person.
Red badges aren't that rare I think most stories have been both proved afnd disproved several times the death of rolls being the most likely , but that was much earlier than this car is likely to be
Charles Rolls died in 1910 Henry Royce died in 1933 The color was changed around the time of Royce's death, but some state it was Royce's idea, since red might clash with the body color. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rolls-Royce_Limited
That was my first thought, when I read the title. I can envision ol' Travis and Meyer pulling up to the Busted Flush in Miss Agnes.
I remember about 20yrs ago,there was a Rolls Royce Hearse and a Woody,for sale in the Old Car Trader. The Hearse was 15k and the Woody was 20k. The Hearse was SO cool! I think they were late 1920's.
For several years I worked for a shop that specialized in restoring Rolls-Royce cars. The shop owner knew a lot about the cars; talked to people at Rolls about parts, prints, etc; and was a consultant for the Rolls-Royce Technical Society. He said the red to black change was made when Royce died. I don't know anything about it first-hand, but I'm inclined to believe my old boss.
I'm from pretty much the same background , there are black cars that pre date his death though I got my rolls and royce mixed up :$
Rolls was the promoter. Royce was the mechanical perfectionist. There was a third guy who's name I don't remember. He was the general manager who kept all the plates spinning. Part of his job was insuring some cars got built by keeping Royce from taking guys off the line to try things, and implementing too many running improvements.
On July 2nd we a small car show here at the local chevy dealer. That truck pulled up in the parking lot,I made him come into the show ,very nice guy they where shipping the car back to the mainlande and stopped here.The owner said he built that body just to do that race. One or two of his grandsons went with him.That is on real cool truck
Here's a link to some classy looking Rolls Royce "Shooting Brakes". (That's "Woodies" to y'all!) http://www.google.com/search?tbm=is....,cf.osb&fp=e327c586848a1e31&biw=1334&bih=712
After shipping rolls from hawaii to calf. my wife and i drove to new england our home I just returned from India and Nepal. a bit over 5000 miles crossing the highest motorinable roads in the world. 18380 ft
Welcome to the Hamb 333HH - that's a fine pickup you have there. Would love to see photos of your trip. It sounds as if it was a real challenge....
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