THE TWENTY ARRIVES IN AUSTRALIA

The arrival of the first Twenty HP chassis in Australia in January 1923 must have created a great deal of interest amongst the local motoring fraternity. It was quite unlike the familiar 40/50 HP car that had been in production since 1906. The new Twenty with its 6 cylinder Over Head Valve engine, 3 speed central gearchange and rear wheel brake arrangement was similar to most of the then current American cars although the difference in price and quality was very marked.

The Twenty sold well and many were fitted with local coachwork by a variety of Australian coachbuilders who were familiar with our severe road conditions and these local bodies usually proved longer lasting than many of British manufacture. A high number of cars were rebodied in the 1930s to keep abreast of the change in body styles as the chassis of these cars were in good mechanical condition.

Between 1922 and 1929 a total of 2912 chassis were produced and in 1929, due to customers demands for improved performance and heavier coachwork the 20 became the 20/25 with larger engine and other improvements. Andre Blaize in France has records of 1250 surviving 20 hp cars.

It is thought that 150 Twenties came to this country as new chassis and of these only 9 are known to have been dismantled and no doubt provided spare parts for many surviving cars. One new car that arrived here in 1929 remained unsold due to the Depression and was returned to England.

In the 1922 /29 period a total of approximately ninety 40/50hp chassis were sold here, 64 of which were New Phantoms.

During the last 40 years, nine cars have been exported from Australia, mainly to the UK and USA, one of which was driven back overland to the UK. About the same number of cars have been imported in these later years and the current Australian ownership amongst the States is as follows:

State	Imports	Current
New South Wales	52	(49)
Victoria	47	(42)
South Australia	13	(14)
Queensland		(16)
Western Australia	11
Tasmania	7
Northern Territory	2
ACT	1

The Twenty HP car proved to be a very successful model and the first of a long line of small horse power cars that were to become the mainstay of the Company's car production.

Martin McCarthy