1928 Rolls-Royce 20 HP Park Ward Saloon Complementing the mighty 40/50hp models – first the Silver Ghost, later the Phantom – the Rolls Royce 20hp was the company’s ‘small’ car for the 1920s – although of course small here is a purely comparative term! Much more attainable than a 40/50, it was nevertheless a very expensive high-quality car, built with all the attention detail and engineering rigour as its larger siblings.

Based on a very strongly-built conventional chassis, with semi-elliptic springs all round, the car was powered by a new 3127cc overhead-valve straight-six, offering around 50bhp by most estimates – although of course Rolls Royce themselves never did anything so vulgar as publishing brake horsepower outputs.

Early cars had a 3-speed gearbox with central change; from 1925 this was upgraded to a 4-speed, with the change moved to the right of the driver.

That year also saw the introduction of very effective 4-wheel brakes, operated as in the larger cars by a gear...