From the archive: A royal Rolls-Royce

"In front, there are two very larger and comfortable armchairs upholstered in green leather. The driving seat is separately adjustable and a sufficient sliding range has been provided to enable the car to be driven comfortably by a tall driver such as the Duke of Edinburgh himself. Each of the front seats is provided with two armrests which fold away into the backrest when not required.

"Heating and ventilation arrangements are very thorough. Two air intakes, one on each side of the radiator, supply fresh air to ducts which feed front and rear compartments, and there are three heaters, drawing warm water from the engine cylinder head. The rear quaterlights incorporate swivelling ventilation panes with a large arc of movement."

Of course, the new Phantom also featured all the latest electronic gadgetry of the time: "Control buttons for the heating system, division, electric window winders and ashtrays are located in the outer two armrests in the rear compartment.

"The centre armrest has built into it the controls for the radio set and also includes a glovebox. The radio itself is concealed in the luggage compartment and operates two loudspeakers, one in the cabinet work and the division and another in the driving comparment, which is provided with a separate volume control." God forbid Her Royal Highness miss the BBC Light Programme, after all. Naturally, cigarette lighters and hand mirrors were also provided.

On the mechanical side, we described how the underpinnings were the latest in a line "stretching back to the immortal Silver Rolls-Royce Ghost [of 1906-26] and reaffirming the position of the Rolls-Royce firm as makers of a car which is not only the finest in the world mechanically, but also one which for size, power and performance can justly be regarded as the most magnificient in the world."

Isn't it wonderful to read prose so unabashedly confident of something British? That sentence written today would generally be considered laughable, to the great detriment of the little that remains of national spirit and pride.

Anyhow, I digress; back seven interluding decades now to the wonderfully analogue mechanical doings of the day. "A range of four, six and eight-cylinder engines with common valve, piston and connecting rod assemblies was designed to the order of the Ministry of Supply some time ago," we said, "and major components from this range were used in evolving an eight-cylinder car engine which has run for some time in an experimental Bentley chassis. This same engine has provided the basis for the power unit used in the new Rolls-Royce chassis.

"Like those of the other Rolls-Royce and Bentley cars now in production, it has overhead inlet valves and side exhaust valves and uses a cylinder head of aluminium alloy RR50 with inserted valve seats. The crankshaft is of chrome molybdenum steel and runs in nine main bearings. The crank pins are nitrided and the bearings have thin shells of copper-lead-indium. The crankcase is in cast iron and at the top of each cylinder is a short hard line of chrome-iron in the area where cylinder wear is normally concentrated. Pistons are in RR53 aluminium alloy and are tin-plated, with one compression ring, one L-section scraper and a slotted oil control ring.

"There is a helical gear oil pump in the crankcase with feed intake and a bypass filter on the outside of the cylinder block. The external pressure relief valve controls the high-pressure feed to main and big-end bearings, camshaft bearings and skew gear drive to oil pump and distributor, with a low-pressure feed to valve gear and timing gears.

"The cooling system incorporates radiator shutters controlled by a thermostat in the header tank and there is an auxiliary thermostat in the cylinder head which ensures rapid warming up from cold and provides the earliest possible supply of warm water to the interior heating system."

The chassis itself generally followed the 1946-58 Silver Rolls-Royce Wraith, with suspension of coil springs and wishbones, plus an anti-roll bar, at the front and a rigid axle with half-eliptic springs at the rear. Each end also featured double-acting hydraulic dampers. The steering, meanwhile, was by cam and roller, with a fore-and-aft drag link leading to a bell crank that operated the divided track rod.

"Transmission is through a conventional four-speed gearbox with right-hand control," we continued, "and there is the usual Rolls-Royce friction servo motor on the gearbox to operate the brakes, those at the front being hydraulically controlled and those at the rear through a mechanical linkage."

We concluded our thoughts on the new Phantom VI - finished in dark green with chromium-plated fittings and mouldings - in style: "No further comment is necessary, because it represents the finest work which skill and conscientious craftsmanship can produce."