From the Rolls-Royce experimental archive: a quarter of a million communications from Rolls-Royce, 1906 to 1960's. Documents from the Sir Henry Royce Memorial Foundation (SHRMF).
Demonstration run for Mr. Glicksten Junr., comparing a Rolls-Royce Open-touring car against a Napier on a hill climb.
| Identifier | ExFiles\Box 29\3\ Scan087 | |
| Date | 30th April 1921 | |
| To BJ. c. to CJ c. to R.{Sir Henry Royce} c. to Hs.{Lord Ernest Hives - Chair} c. to EP.{G. Eric Platford - Chief Quality Engineer} c. to C. x788 X.437 X4594 X.788 On the 28th.inst. I gave Mr. Glicksten Junr. a demonstration run in our Open-touring car No. 81-TW. This meeting arose out of the recent visit of Mr. Glicksten, and I think his father, to Derby in respect of certain complaints they made concerning the new Rolls-Royce Limousine they purchased, Ep.{G. Eric Platford - Chief Quality Engineer} having suggested that he thought Mr. Glicksten would be interested in having a run on one of our Open cars. This young gentleman evidently spends most of his life using and racing motors, the latter at Brooklands, and he is very much alive to all the mechanical features of a car and immediately notices the slightest characteristic in performance. On his advice we ran our car up West Hill, Highgate, which is undoubtedly a very excellent and severe hill on which to try a car on top gear for speed. Mr. Glicksten had already indicated that his chief interest in coming with me was to compare in his mind the performance of our car with that of an Open Touring Napier car, having much the same type of body, on which he was given a demonstration on the same hill recently. As I passed a letter pillar-box at the beginning of the hill at 42 M.P.H., Mr. Glicksten mentioned that when testing the Napier, he had insisted upon their speed by the pillar-box not being greater than 20 M.P.H. We continued up the hill and at the steepest part, which is also a fairly severe curve, our speed did not drop below 22 M.P.H. on direct drive. I considered that the performance judged by our standard, was extremely good, but Mr. Glicksten remarked "Of course it is very commendable for any car to come up this hill on top gear, but at the same time your performance does not in any way compare with that of the Napier car, the speed of which did not fall below 32 M.P.H. on the steepest part," and as stated above, the hill was started by the pillar-box at only 22 M.P.H. The Napier chassis is as I understand, five cwts. less weight than ours. The engine of course is also smaller. Mr. Glicksten stated that a short time ago he had weighed two cars, one a Napier with a Cunard Limousine, the other a Rolls-Royce with a similar Limousine by the Cunard Co., and that the latter car complete with the same weights of fuel and water etc. weighed 7 cwts. more than the Napier. Contd:- | ||