SS & Jaguar Cars

Book excerpt: Following on from his book S.S.I and S.S.II Cars, Allan Crouch details the models that succeeded them: the 1½ and 2½ Litre of 1936-37, the SS100 sports car, the1½, 2½ and 3½ Litre of 1938-48, and the Mark V of 1948-51. Apart from the 1½ Litres, what was common to these cars was the six-cylinder engine, based on a Standard sidevalve unit for which Harry Weslake designed an overhead-valve cylinder head giving very respectable power outputs. Combined with flowing body styling inspired by William Lyons himself, the result was some strikingly attractive and desirable cars, at extraordinarily keen prices. Here the development and evolution of the range are described, complete with competition history, production figures and specifications, all accompanied by 250 colour photographs and 80 black-and-white images from the archives.