Dick Protheroe 1922 - 1966
Marina Rolls
Royce
No information has been found so far on the relevance of
these photographs in my possession. I have two batches of photographs
taken by Rosemary Massey of both
this car and the Ferrari 330 which
were taken around about the same time. A brief
summary of the history of this car is provided at the bottom of the
page. Email Geoff
Protheroe
The car was seen recently with its Rolls Royce
engine installed.
An interesting Autosport advertisement from 1965
The
link here describes in detail this car. Marina
Rolls Royce 1963
The image on the left is a recent one of the Rolls Royce engine that was
used in the car originally. According to documentation in the link
above Rolls Royce were very unhappy about this and the cars competition
days were ended shortly after they started in the early 60's. My thanks to Terry McGrath for the photo. |
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The advertisement shown here was placed in Autosport on 19th February 1965
. The 2nd car offered for sale may or may not be the Marina above
however the time scale is about right. Also Rosemary was a keen
photographer and tended to document all the cars they had. No other car
was around at that time with that description as far as I am aware.
Interesting wording also - "cast alloy wheels "- "body with two quickly
detachable sections" - "suitable for any large American engine" |
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This original drawing is one of a number I have found which show details of
body work, suspension and tubular frame. Click drawing for larger view. |
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The two letters featured here are from the originals and clearly relate to
Rolls Royce pistons. I also have the scale engineering drawings of the pistons. Clearly marked as for a V8 with a note "One engine set comprises of 4 A pistons and 4 B" The pistons show a valve cutout (inlet) mirrored in A and B. The interesting part is that the car was advertised above in February of that year and yet these letters are June. Was the car sold with a rebuild ordered ? Did Dick fail to sell and change his plans ? |
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A clear mention of Rolls Royce in both letters. If this was a marine engine
hence "Marina" was it the marine engine cylinder head they mention in
the letter which was discontinued. |
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Added to the above I also have
engineering scale drawing, found with above, of a transaxle by
Hewland Eng Ltd. No dates or letters as yet however on the drawing are
the following comments. |
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Acknowledgement to Motorbase |
Simon Ashworth (current owner) very kindly emailed me a brief summary of the car below; |