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).
Adoption of American all-steel body coachwork designs and manufacturing methods.
| Identifier | ExFiles\Box 117\1\ scan0020 | |
| Date | 30th April 1934 | |
| TO HS{Lord Ernest Hives - Chair}/RM.{William Robotham - Chief Engineer} FROM EV.{Ivan Evernden - coachwork} COPY TO SG.{Arthur F. Sidgreaves - MD} WOR.{Arthur Wormald - General Works Manager} LHS.{Lord Herbert Scott} C. CK.{Mr Clark} H.{Arthur M. Hanbury - Head Complaints} X4685 EV{Ivan Evernden - coachwork}2/30.4.34. RE HIGH CLASS AMERICAN COACHWORK. We were very interested in all that you were able to tell us about coachwork in America, and we agree that from the structural point of view the all steel body (and the several derivations of it) is very far ahead of anything our leading coachbuilders can produce. At one time we had to admit that the die costs made the all steel body an impossibility as far as we were concerned. Now, after what you told us about Cadillac with an output about equal to Bentley, we may have to reconsider the matter. We differ from Cadillac in the case of Bentley in that whereas nearly all of their output has standard coachwork, in our case 40% does. In the case of the 25.HP. this figure is lower, and of course is lowered still more on P.2. If batch orders of 50 bodies can now be considered by American producers, with our present output it would appear to us that the following bodies might be so manufactured. Bentley Four Door Saloon. 25HP. Four Door Saloon. 25.HP. Enclosed Drive Limousine. Two other things would be necessary. Chassis design would have to stay much more constant than it has done hitherto, and there could be no accepting of orders for the standardised body with slight modifications. This latter is quite common. In view of these considerations, alone, and forgetting those of policy and trading conditions, we suggest that we should put an all steel body on one of our chassis to learn how and where it is so good, and then set out to get the same results on a body of our own by copying the American design where we can, and by inventing new methods of our own in cases where we cannot. We suggest that the whole of those parts common to every body on a particular chassis should be made in steel. We are about to do this on Bentley, comprising the bottom-sides body crossmembers floor, seatboards and wells. We would like to add the front scuttle. The pillars will be of cast Alpex, which we suggest is to be preferred to the steel pressing used in U.S.A. because it can be of smaller section. We still believe that an all steel body will be heavier than the lightest similar body of our own. We know that our proposed new metal construction will be heavier than that which we have at present, but that we shall be able to save this added essential weight on non vital parts such as seats, floors and running-boards. Steel wings we know are heavier than our aluminium ones, but if we had an American type if metal stepboard we believe we could save the extra weight in the wings. It will be necessary to find out from America how the rust trouble is got over. [Signature: EV{Ivan Evernden - coachwork}] | ||