1952 Rolls-Royce Silver Dawn Drophead

The Rolls-Royce Silver Dawn is a car that was produced by Rolls-Royce at their Crewe works between 1949 and 1955. It was the first Rolls-Royce car to be offered with a factory built body which it shared, along with its chassis, with the Bentley Mark VI until 1952 and then the Bentley R Type until production finished in 1955. The car was first introduced as an export only model. The left hand drive models had a column gear change, while right hand drives had a floor change by the door. Only with the R Type based model was it officially available on the home market, from October 1953.

A mere 760 were produced between 1949 and 1955, with only 28 drophead bodies produced between 1950 and 1954. Earlier models up to circa May 1954 had a different fascia (dashboard) from the Bentley Mk.VI and ‘R’ Type, and were fitted with a single exhaust system. Later models from the SRH chassis series had the Bentley style fascia and the twin exhaust system, as fitted to the Bentley ‘R’ Type. On the Standard Steel cars throughout the production history, all the body panels forward of the bulkhead/firewall were slightly different from those fitted to the Bentley.

Source: Wikipedia (original)