Pictures from the Heritage Archives

Sole survivor!

In this entry we take a look at the very rare Wilson-Pilcher car which is one of approximately 300 cars made between 1900 and 1907.These were manufactured in London till 1904 when the company was taken over by Sir W.G. Armstrong Whitworth and production moved to Scotswood Works in Newcastle upon Tyne.

Even today the design is regarded as quite advanced. The engine gave smooth vibration free running and the epicyclic gearbox not only made gear changing very easy, but completely noise free. Wilson-Pilcher drivers must have been the envy of those struggling with the more common non synchromesh manual gear change.

As well as designing and building the Wilson-Pilcher cars, Walter Wilson made a major contribution to the design of the First World War Tanks. Later in 1928 he partnered with John Siddeley and the Wilson Pre-selector gearbox was then fitted as standard to Armstrong Siddeley cars.

Due to an earlier attempt to fit the pre-selective gear box to Vauxhall cars he was trumped by G.M. America purchasing the Vauxhall company who filed his gearbox in some  dusty corner of their works in the States. Towards the close of the 1930’s it was noticed and with further development would become the basis of the  automatic gearbox.