14 Dec 06
Royal Aircraft Factory RE7
Newcastle-on-Tyne engineering conglomerate Armstrong-Whitworth had been making cars - as well as ships and locomotives - since the early 20th century; it started by taking over construction of London firm Wilson-Pilcher's 2.7-litre and 4.0-litre cars in 1904, making a range of its own models from 1906; it formed its aero division in 1913, and established a 30-acre site at Coventry Parkside to build over 1,000 RE7 and RE 8 aircraft (designed by the Royal Aircraft Factory at Farnborough) and 4,200 Puma aeroplane engines.
Meanwhile, John Davenport Siddeley had been working at Wolseley, but fell out with Herbert Austin (founder of the Austin marque) and departed for Coventry-based Deasey in 1909, taking control of the firm in 1912. Siddeley saw the opportunities in the aircraft engine industry, and sub-contracted production of light-alloy castings to Armstrong-Whitworth, then collaborating on sales and marketing. Siddeley-Deasey, as it was by then known, and Armstrong-Whitworth merged in 1919.
The Armstrong-Whitworth Siskin twin-gun fighter plane featured an Armstrong-Siddeley engine good for over 140mph, and this plane was supplied to the RAF and Canadian airforces right up to World War II. Yet car building thrived too in the 1920s and '30s, the Coventry firm producing impressively solid but conservative luxury saloons, praised for their quiet engines and options such as the new pre-selector gearbox technology.
Hawker Hurricane
Armstrong-Siddeley bought Hawker Aircraft in 1935, and the new Hawker Siddeley Group - which also incorporated early UK plane-makers Sopwith and Gloster - became an increasingly powerful player in the aeronautical industry. Its huge range of planes, including the Hurricane which fought alongside the Spitfire in the Battle of Britain, the Tempest, the Typhoon, the Fury and the Whitley bomber, formed much of the RAF's fleet. Its engines were supplied to companies worldwide, and it also constructed other companies' designs, such as Avro's Lancaster bomber. Fuselage sections and other components for the Rolls-Royce Merlin-engined Whitley, incidentally, were manufactured by Jaguar during World War II; the former Armstrong-Whitworth factory near Coventry after which the plane was named is now Jaguar's Whitley design and research centre.
Post-war, Armstrong-Siddeley's cars took the names of the successful planes: there was the Hurricane convertible, the Lancaster, Whitley, Typhoon and Tempest, all with six-cylinder engines. The 3.4-litre engine, made from 1954, was even called Sapphire, like the company's aircraft engine. The final Sapphire and Star Sapphire models did not sell well, however; the A-S car-making division was absorbed into the Rootes Group in 1957, the Hawker-Siddeley aircraft business was merged with Bristol to form Bristol-Siddeley, and Armstrong-Siddeley car production ceased in 1960, though the factory continued to build the Sunbeam Alpine for Rootes for two more years at Parkside. Bristol-Siddeley then merged with Rolls-Royce, which has since absorbed further firms including Vickers, and seen its own car-making division sold off separately (see below).
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