Armstrong-Siddeley
Armstrong-Siddeley is a British company that was founded in 1919 by John Davenport Siddeley, who was later knighted and made 1st Baron of Kenilworth. It produced small numbers of luxury cars, as well as aircraft engines, until the company merged with the Bristol Aeroplane Company in 1960. The marque is now owned by the Armstrong Siddeley Owners Club Ltd.
The origins of Armstrong-Siddeley
John Siddeley was born in 1866 and started his career working with bicycles. While employed as manager for Dunlop in 1900, he developed an interest in the burgeoning automobile industry. In 1902 he founded the Siddeley Autocar Company, making cars based on Peugeot designs. He sold the company to Wolseley in 1905 and worked for Wolseley-Siddeley as manager before resigning in 1909 and becoming joint manager of the Coventry-based Deasy Motor Company. This was renamed Siddeley-Deasy in 1912 and had success during World War I producing aircraft engines and military vehicles. After the War, the company was bought out by the Armstrong Whitworth Development Company, retaining John Siddeley as managing director and becoming Armstrong-Siddeley Motors Ltd.
Early Armstrong-Siddeley models
The early cars produced by Siddeley’s companies were stately, luxurious and expensive. Wolsey-Siddeley cars were used by King George V and used the advertising slogan ‘cars for the daughters of gentlemen.’ Another slogan from 1912 was ‘as silent as the Sphinx’ and Siddeley later used the Sphinx as a bonnet ornament and included it in the Armstrong-Siddeley logo. The first car produced under the Armstrong-Siddeley name in 1919 was the Thirty; a thirty horsepower machine with a 4900 cc engine that was made up until 1931, with 2770 produced. Smaller variations followed, with 18hp, 14hp, 15hp and 12hp models added between 1922 and 1929. The 1923 Four-Fourteen had the largest Armstrong-Siddeley production run of all time at 13,365. The late 1920s saw the introduction of the Wilson Preselector gearbox which was used in all subsequent cars. Most Armstrong-Siddeley cars produced in the 1930s were six-cylinder, including the 5-litre Siddeley Special of 1933. Armstrong-Siddeley in the post-WWII years After the outbreak of the Second World War, the company concentrated on the development and production of aircraft engines by their Hawker-Siddeley division; no cars were produced between 1942 and 1945. After the war, Armstrong-Siddeley introduced two new cars that were named after war-time aircraft. The Lancaster was a four-door saloon and the Hurricane was a drophead coupe; both six-cylinder cars with 2 litre engines. The Lancaster had the largest production run, with 3597 between 1945 and 1952, while 2606 Hurricanes were manufactured between 1945 and 1953. Other postwar models included the Typhoon, Tempest and Whitley 18. In 1953 the Sapphire four-door saloon was introduced and variations of the Saphhire continued until 1960, when the Star Sapphire was the last car ever made by Armstrong-Siddeley.