RILEY - NUFFIELD SPECIFICATIONS
as Old as the Industry, as modern as the HourBrief History
Riley went bust because they were building too many different models on too many different chassis. Therefore, when the Nuffield group took over it was only natural that a rationalisation programme should be the first course of action. The surprising thing is probably that rather than just trimming the existing range, a clean sweep was seen as necessary. The old 6 cylinder models were an obvious choice to remove from the range - to all intents and purposes Riley had already done this anyway. The ever popular nine had also come more or less to the end of its natural life, the rather unloved Victor being the only model left in the line up.This left the 1½Litre and 2½Litre models, where the Adelphi and Kestrel were still selling strongly. While the Kestrel body was a real Riley design with the flowing lines and elegant styling that had made Rileys so popular in the early 1930s, the Adelphi body was a relatiely staid design, that failed to stand out in the corporate car park of 1938. Nuffield dumped the Kestrel and redesigned the Adelphi to produce a new Riley 'Saloon' available on both the 12 and 16 chassis. It was only after popular demand that the Kestrel was officially relaunched, but only on the larger chassis.
At the same time, Nuffield did recognise the former success, sales wise, of open Rileys, and so they took the new 4-door saloon and restyled it to produce a 2-door Drophead Coupe version. In the brief period which these Nuffield Rileys were available, the drophead took about 20% of the sales, the saloon the remainder, albeit it with perhaps 20-25 Kestrel 16s being sold. There were possibly also other models sold, using up stocks of bodies and chassis. One 15/6 model is believed to have left the factory in 1940 for instance.