Rolls Royce 20/25 K2 Series Drophead Sedanca Coupe by Nutting
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Car producer : |
Rolls Royce |
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Model: |
20/25 K2 Series Drophead Sedanca Coupe by Nutting |
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Year: |
1929-1936 |
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Type: |
Cabriolet |
The Rolls-Royce 20/25 built between 1929 and 1936 succeeded the 20HP as Rolls-Royce's "small car". It was intended to appeal to owner drivers, but many were sold to customers with chauffeurs
The in-line 6-cylinder overhead-valve engine was similar to that used in the 20HP but was enlarged to 3669 cc by increasing the bore from 76 mm to 82 mm, with the stroke remaining at 114 mm. A single Rolls-Royce carburetor was used, and both coil and magneto ignition were fitted. The four-speed gearbox was mounted in unit with the engine and a traditional right-hand change used. Synchromesh was fitted to third and top gears from 1932.
The substantial chassis had rigid front and rear axles suspended by half-elliptic springs with braking on all four wheels assisted by a mechanical servo. Separate rear brakes were fitted for the handbrake. The famous Rolls-Royce radiator with triangular top was used with vertical louvres, the angle of which could be adjusted to control engine cooling. To begin with, the radiator shutters were operated manually via a lever on the dash; later cars were fitted with automatic control via a thermostat.
The larger engine allowed the top speed to increase to 75 mph (121 km/h) but many owners had large limousine bodies fitted to the chassis, with the predictable degradation of performance.
Only the chassis and mechanical parts were made by Rolls-Royce. The body was made and fitted by a coachbuilder selected by the owner. Amongst the most famous coachbuilders who produced bodies for Rolls Royce cars are Park Ward, Thrupp & Maberly, Mulliner and Hooper. British coachbuilding firms offered designs, many of them unique, on the 20/25hp chassis. Some of the most widely admired were the work of J Gurney Nutting. A company associated with quality marques - Bentley in particular - from its earliest days and a supreme practitioner of the coachbuilding craft in the late 1930s, Gurney Nutting had been founded in Croydon, Surrey in 1919. The company had bodied its first Bentley before moving to London's fashionable Chelsea district in 1924, and within a few years was established as the Cricklewood firm's foremost supplier of bodies after Vanden Plas.
Gurney Nutting's work had a sporting flavor from the outset and succeeded in attracting the attention of society's upper echelons; the Prince of Wales and Duke of York were clients, and the firm gained its Royal Warrant in the early 1930s. Daimler and Rolls-Royce had been added to the Gurney Nutting portfolio in the mid-1920s, and the fruitful association with the latter continued into the succeeding decade.
