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).
Car body design evolution, focusing on cornering, wings, footboards, and lamp positioning.
| Identifier | ExFiles\Box 24\1\ Scan053 | |
| Date | 12th December 1931 guessed | |
| 19. of the car in cornering and, at the same time, facilitates the provision of a very large angle of lock in the region of 50°. There is yet another solution that has been adopted by one or two members and that is to widen the front of the car as a whole and make the bonnet merge into the fixed wing as in Fig........ This method solves the front door problem but makes the air escape from the front radiator very difficult. I think that if the close fitting wing is not used that this system is the only practical one. As regards the back mudwing the questions of lock and air excape do not enter into the problem and in our latest models the back wheels are enclosed so that the streamline flow is unbroken, see Fig....... Closely associated with the fender or mudwing question is that of the footboard. In our earlier models no footboards were fitted, but in our latest models these are fitted throughout the length of the car see Fig.... The reasons for this are twofold. If the car is pulled up some little distance from the curb, it is very inconvenient to have no footboard, and second and fore and after fender fitted to the coachwork must take any blow and the damage to paintwork may be extensive. Once the design of the wings is settled, the next feature affecting appearance is the shape of the front or bonnet, and the position of the lamps, and here again we have been through a process of elimination and evolution. The feature that was made a condition was that the lamps were to be under cover and locked up, and so mounted as to give a diffused light to the side, enabling sign posts to be read when passing at slow speed. After the No.1 car had been built it was evident that the appearance of the front of the car had to be dealt with | ||