Displacement About Railton
Railton was a British car maker based in Cobham, Surrey between 1933 and 1940. An attempt to revive the marque by a new company was attempted between 1989 and 1994 in Alcester, Worcestershire.
The company was started by Noel Macklin who was looking for a new car making venture after he sold his Invicta company in 1933. The name came from Reid Railton, the world speed record car designer, but his input was probably small although he did receive a royalty on each car sold.
The first car was made by fitting a British body made by coachbuilder Ranalah to a 4010 cc, 8 cylinder Hudson Terraplane chassis. The resulting machine, at first available as a two door tourer, was lighter than the original and had, for the time, exceptional performance with a 0-60 mph time of 13 seconds. . A saloon bodied version was soon added to the range and the cars were priced at £499.
In 1935 the original Terraplane chassis was replaced by the one from the Hudson Eight and the engine grew to 4168 cc and a wider range of bodies from several coachbuilders was on offer. Two special lightweight models were made in 1935 and with a 0-60 time of 8.8 seconds were claimed to be the fastest production cars in the world. Altogether 1379 of the Railton 8 were made.
