Footnotes

• Following a parallel path to Rolls-Royce, Lanchester moved away from their one model policy, introducing a smaller car, the 21hp model, to be marketed alongside the 40hp car and first exhibited at the 1923 Motor Exhibition at Olympia. The early design featured a 2.9 litre engine, however by 1925 was increased to 3,340cc. It is the enlarged engine fitted to this car. With a price advantage of approximately £1,000 compared with the 40hp model, the Lanchester 21hp tapped into a new market. Top speed of the car was variously quoted between 66mph and 75mph. As always the Lanchester was superbly engineered, the silky smooth, six-cylinder, overhead valve engine running almost in silence and driving through a conventional gearbox, the Board having over-ruled George Lanchester who had favoured the company’s traditional epycyclic box.
  
  This car, built on the optional short wheel base chassis, was supplied to its first owner, Mr K Meaby of Southwell, in 1928. Remarkably it was first registered with the number RR 1. The car was regularly chauffeur driven and the Meaby family crest can still be faintly detected on the passenger door. The present owner, just the second owner of this car, bought the car in 1962. An apparent third owner had the car for just one day that year to enable the RR 1 plate to be removed. For the last forty years this ‘time warp’ motor car has languished in the second owner’s barn, however was briefly recommissioned and shown at the Lanchester Centenary in Birmingham in 1995. In recent weeks, with fresh fuel and clean sparking plugs, the car started and ran smoothly. The recorded 73,000 or so miles is believed correct. A modern 12 volt ignition coil is fitted although the original 6 volt coil is offered with the car. The Lanchester comes with original log book, a driver’s manual, Lucas electric instruction book, period tools and other interesting paperwork and carries an R.A.C. badge with a 1928 renewal disc.
  
  Cars of such charm and integrity are becoming increasingly difficult to find and DS 7464 will we feel respond well to careful conservation.