The Trojan Museum Trust Patron Tim Schenken News Sheet No. 24 Winter 2017
Dear Friends, Welcome to your winter news sheet, it seems like a lot of things have been happening since we last spoke. The biggest piece of news is that the Trust has been able to purchase a 1931 Trojan RE saloon for it's collection. You may remember that I mentioned that we had tried to purchase this car a couple of years ago when it appeared in auction but at the time it was withdrawn from sale, however we have now been successful in purchasing it direct from the owner. The Trojan RE or Rear Engined, was the car which Trojan hoped would replace their standard utility and its derivatives which by the late 20's were looking decidedly old fashioned. The RE was designed by Leslie Hounsfield and was meant to have a variety of innovative design features. One being a traffic clutch but the most unusual was the reason for the rear engine. The engine was mounted in a box on the back of the car, which also housed the gear box, drive chain and in the original design the radiator. The idea being that you could drive your car to the nearest Trojan garage, they would unclip the back box complete with back axle and the complete braking system. They then would replace it
with a 'courtesy' engine, you could then drive away to return later to collect your fully serviced engine. However the prototype had problems with over heating from the evaporation radiator, which was designed to steam all the time, and the release date for the new car kept slipping. It was meant to be available to buy after it's launch in 1929 but the delays kept coming. Finally Basil Monk decided that they had to release the car and fulfil orders, so he over ruled Hounsfield's protests and launched the car with a conventional radiator on the front and with the rear box no longer removable. Hounsfield was so angry that he resigned from the company, he said the car was not ready to be sold to the general public. He was proved correct. The front mounted radiator needed 25 foot of radiator hose to connect it to the engine and even with a pump the system never worked well. The car also still only had rear brakes and although a new three speed gear box increased the top speed to 45 mph it was being sold as a fairly luxurious car, and in the 1930's such cars had four wheeled brakes and top speeds of 80 mph plus. Trojan produced many different models of the RE in an attempt to sell them but it was a flop and even
after nearly 5 years of sales it is believed that only around 100 cars where ever sold. It was effectively the end of pre-war car production for Trojan.! As far as we know only five Trojan REs survive, two saloons, two Blackdown Tourers and one Exmoor Tourer. We are not absolutely sure of the exact models of the two saloons, though ours is probably a
Guildford. One of the saloons and both the Blackdown Tourers were restored from complete wrecks of a car, the Exmoor Tourer is unrestored but in pieces with no interior, the only RE to have survived in relatively sound original unrestored condition is the saloon we have just bought. So it is a unique survivor, it is still in it's original paint. It is the first time that the Trust has been able to purchase what is quite an expensive vehicle, this has been made possible thanks to four very generous donors, Chris Bird who in fact used to own and drive this very car in the early 60's, Paul Tucker and two anonymous donors. The Trust also had to put in some money from it's funds, but we felt it was well worth while to obtain this rare car.
The RE saloon also completes our collection of RE's as we already own an 80% restored Blackdown Tourer and the dismantled Exmoor Tourer. I can not thank enough the generosity of the donators which have allowed the Trust to acquire this car. We have been approached by a documentary making team who are putting together a film to mark 50 years of Trojan Records. Trojan Records is a Reggae record label that was started in 1968 by Duke Reid in Jamaica. One of his most famous signings was Bob Marley.
He decided to call it Trojan Records after his Trojan pick up truck in which he travelled around Jamaica loaded with a large sound system to promote his music. The documentary team want to borrow a Trojan pick up truck to use in the filming, sadly we don't have the correct sort in our collection, but we are trying to track one down for them. This photo shows the sort of Trojan that Trojan Records used, though this photo comes from Chile We recently received a kind donation to our Trust archive from Mike Shepherd, it is an original brochure fore the Lady's Coupe model Trojan.
The Coupe was a standard mid twenties Utility fitted with a detachable hard top. The brochure was designed to be attractive to possible lady buyers and so comes in a neat envelope and is tied with a ribbon. The one donated to us is complete with ribbon and envelope and so is a very rare survivor and great to have in our archive. There is just one known surviving original coupe top and that is owned by one of the friends of the Trust.
Well I hope that you've found this news sheet interesting and thank you to you all for all your loyal support of the Trust, it is only through this support that we are able to keep going and to keep working towards our goal of a Trojan Museum. I hope that you all have a wonderful and blessed Christmas. David Hambleton 5 St Johns Close, Fyfield. Oxon. OX13 5LP 01865 390124 david_hambleton@hotmail.com www.trojanmuseumtrust.org