Rover P4

by Malcolm Bobbitt

Nowadays affectionately known as the "Aunty" Rover, the dignified P4 series of cars was launched in 1949 to carry Britain's Rover company into the postwar era. Embodying all the traditional quality and luxury expected from the revered Rover marque when the words "Made in Britain" denoted excellence, the cars appealed to the professional classes and proved so popular that they remained in production for twenty years, selling all around the world.

Malcolm Bobbitt's work is the complete source book on the P4 Rovers including development history, jet cars, the Marauder, guidance on buying and restoration, life with a P4 and appendices packed with essential data and details of clubs and specialists.

Contents:

Chapter I
Starley, Wilks & The P4

• Sewing machines, cycles and cars
• War, boom years, the Depression
• Spencer Wilks arrives
• Quality, not quantity
• One of Britain's fine cars
• Shadow factories and the war effort
• Enter Solihull
• The M1 project
• New era: postwar design and the P3 stopgap
• The Studebaker affair
• The P4 emerges
• Arrival of the Viking

Chapter II
Development & Chronology

• 6-cylinder 75, 90, 95 & 100; 105 & 110
• Popularizing the P4, 60 & 80
• 4-cylinder cars
• Auntie explained
• Early problems
• Creature comforts
• Stopping power
• First changes to the P4
• The 2.6-litre Cyclops Rover
• Exit Cyclops: enter a new image
• The model range widens
• The 1954 model range - enter the 60
• The 90 makes its debut
• David Bache and the 1955 facelift
• Expanding the range again
• Old friends depart - new arrivals

Chapter III
Gas-Turbines & The Jet Era

• Gas-turbine - the potential power
• JET 1 makes its debut
• The Jabbeke Trials
• The next phase: the T2 & T2A
• T3 - a new direction
• T3 - impressive by all standards
• T4 - almost there
• Rover BRM - the ultimate gas-turbine

Chapter IV
Marauders, Coupés & Specials

• Enter the Rover Special
• From the Rover Special to the Marauder
• The Marauder takes shape
• The Marauder - 'for fast touring'
• Fixed and drophead coupés
• A drophead for £20
• The Farina episode and the Italian connection
• The Irish connection
• Royalty and the P4
• What might have been

Chapter V
Living with a P4

• Owning & buying a P4
• What to pay for a P4
• The down-side: foibles & weaknesses
• Publicity & the P4
• Thirty years on
• Profile of a P4 enthusiast

Appendices

I: Original specifications & general data
II: At-a-glance chronology
III: Production figures
IV: P4 colour schemes
V: Rover specialists
VI: Clubs
VII:  Bibliography

Buch, Softcover, 20,5 x 25 cm, 192 Seiten, 30 farbige und 200 s/w-Abbildungen, englischer Text