The D8 was Louis Delage’s pièce de résistance, the work of chief engineer Maurice Gualtier.

With a four-liter, five-main-bearing straight-eight, it made 105 bhp and was possessed of a smoothness and silence that put it in Hispano territory, rivaling Bentley.

Delage also offered a sports version, the D8S.

Available only on the short, 130-in.

wheelbase, the car had a lowered chassis and an engine with higher compression and revised camshaft profile, resulting in 120 bhp.

The Autocar tested one to 99 mph, then demonstrated a 0–60 time of 15 seconds, a remarkable feat and better than a supercharged Bentley.

This Delage D8 was sent out new to Tasmania, just off the southeastern coast of Australia.

The second owner was on King Island, just north of Tasmania, and by 1985 it had been purchased by Paul Rodis of Melbourne, Victoria, on the mainland.

Rodis undertook some work on the car, but sold it to Antony Osborne in 2001.

Osborne, an enthusiastic collector and owner of The Delage Gar...