Railton (car)
Encyclopedia
Railton was a British car maker based in Cobham
Cobham, Surrey
Cobham is a town in the Borough of Elmbridge in Surrey, England, about south-west of central London and north of Leatherhead. Elmbridge has been acclaimed by the Daily Mail as the best place to live in the UK, and Cobham is a prosperous part of the London commuter belt...
, Surrey between 1933 and 1940. There was an attempt to revive the marque by a new company between 1989 and 1994 in Alcester
Alcester
Alcester is an old market town of Roman origin at the junction of the River Alne and River Arrow in Warwickshire, England. It is situated approximately west of Stratford-upon-Avon, and 8 miles south of Redditch, close to the Worcestershire border...
, Warwickshire.
The company was started by Noel Macklin
Noel Macklin
Sir Noel Campbell Macklin was an innovative British car maker and boat designer. He was also the father of post-war sports car and Formula One racing driver Lance Macklin....
who was looking for a new car making venture after he sold his Invicta
Invicta (car)
Invicta is a British automobile manufacturer. The brand has been available intermittently through successive decades. Initially, the manufacturer was based in Cobham, Surrey, England from 1925 to 1933, then in Chelsea, London, England from 1933 to 1938 and finally in Virginia Water, Surrey, England...
company in 1933. The name came from Reid Railton, the world speed record car designer, but his input was probably small although he did receive a royalty on each car sold.
The first car was made by fitting a British body made by coachbuilder Ranalah to a 4010 cc, 8 cylinder Hudson Terraplane
Terraplane
The Terraplane was a car brand and model built by the Hudson Motor Car Company of Detroit, Michigan between 1932 and 1938. In its maiden year, the car was branded as the Essex-Terraplane; in 1934 the car became simply the Terraplane...
chassis. The resulting machine, at first available as a two door tourer, was lighter than the original and had, for the time, exceptional performance with a 0-60 mph time of 13 seconds. . A saloon bodied version was soon added to the range and the cars were priced at £499.
In 1935 the original Terraplane chassis was replaced by the one from the Hudson Eight and the engine grew to 4168 cc and a wider range of bodies from several coachbuilders was on offer. Two special lightweight models were made in 1935 and with a 0-60 time of 8.8 seconds were claimed to be the fastest production cars in the world. Altogether 1379 of the Railton 8 were made.
A smaller six-cylinder car, the 16.9 was added in 1937 using a 2723 cc Hudson 6 cylinder engine and chassis, but only 81 were made in saloon or drophead coupé form and priced at £399.
An even smaller Railton, the 10 hp, joined the range in 1938 built on a Standard Flying Nine chassis and with either saloon or drophead coupé bodywork was claimed to be "A famous name in miniature". 51 were made selling at £299. In 1938 Motor Sport tested a 28.8 h.p. Railton Cobham saloon, FPH 970, offered for sale at £698.
Noel Macklin turned his attention to powerboats in 1939 and he sold the company to Hudson Motor Car Company
Hudson Motor Car Company
The Hudson Motor Car Company made Hudson and other brand automobiles in Detroit, Michigan, from 1909 to 1954. In 1954, Hudson merged with Nash-Kelvinator Corporation to form American Motors. The Hudson name was continued through the 1957 model year, after which it was dropped.- Company strategy...
of Detroit, Michigan
Detroit, Michigan
Detroit is the major city among the primary cultural, financial, and transportation centers in the Metro Detroit area, a region of 5.2 million people. As the seat of Wayne County, the city of Detroit is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan and serves as a major port on the Detroit River...
, who transferred production to their Chiswick
Chiswick
Chiswick is a large suburb of west London, England and part of the London Borough of Hounslow. It is located on a meander of the River Thames, west of Charing Cross and is one of 35 major centres identified in the London Plan. It was historically an ancient parish in the county of Middlesex, with...
, London works. However, the outbreak of war in 1939 stopped production.
After World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
a few cars were completed using pre war parts and a new model was built and shown at the 1949 London Motor Show. However, at nearly £5000 the car was incredibly expensive and it never went into production.
1989 revival
The name was revived by a new Railton Motor Company, founded in 1989 in WixfordWixford
Wixford is a hamlet and civil parish in the Stratford district of Warwickshire, England, situated south of Alcester. The name derives from a compound of the Old English personal name Whitlac with the noun for a river crossing "ford"...
, Warwickshire
Warwickshire
Warwickshire is a landlocked non-metropolitan county in the West Midlands region of England. The county town is Warwick, although the largest town is Nuneaton. The county is famous for being the birthplace of William Shakespeare...
. Two convertible models, the F28 Fairmile and the F29 Claremont were announced. Both were styled by William Towns
William Towns
William Towns was a British car designer.Towns began his training as a designer at Rootes in 1954, where he was mainly involved in the styling of seats and door handles. Later he was also involved with the styling of their Hillman Hunter. He moved to Rover in 1963 and worked there for David...
and based on Jaguar XJS
Jaguar XJS
The Jaguar XJ-S is a luxury grand tourer produced by the British manufacturer Jaguar from 1975 to 1996. The XJ-S replaced the E-Type in September 1975, and was based on the XJ saloon. It had been developed as the XK-F, though it was very different in character from its predecessor...
running gear with new aluminium bodywork. Production seems to have stopped in about 1994.
British motoring journalist Paul Walton
Paul Walton
Paul Walton is a British motoring journalist.His career started in 1999 working for Classic Cars magazine before moving to BBC Top Gear Magazine in 2002....
has written about the Railton F28 Fairmile.