Aberdonia Cars

Aberdonia Cars Ltd was the vehicle identity established in London by Brown, Hughes and Strachan's coachbuilding circle. The company was formed in 1911, or possibly 1912 in later summaries, to manufacture and sell a new car rather than merely body another maker's chassis. Its Park Royal car used a 3,161 cc side-valve inline-four, calculated from an 89 mm bore and 127 mm stroke, with a 16/20 HP tax-and-marketing designation and a 3,048 mm wheelbase. The unusual layout placed the driver ahead of the engine in a forward-control or mid-engined arrangement. Brown, Hughes & Strachan built the bodies, including a seven-seat touring body priced at £500 and a special landaulet at £700; a two-seat cabriolet is also reported. The prototype was shown at the 1911 London Motor Show, and a specially adapted long-wheelbase chassis was built in 1913 for an Indian maharaja. A 1914 stretcher-carrier prototype demonstrated the chassis's utility, but wartime production shifted toward ambulances, mobile bathing and washing vehicles and field kitchens. The Park Royal facilities were destroyed by fire in April 1915, and the associated coachbuilding business was liquidated in 1916. Those wartime bodies on other chassis are not counted as additional Aberdonia models. The accessible record supports one passenger-car family, the 16/20 HP Park Royal, with body choices retained as configurations and with no precise output, serial range or survivor total asserted. Brown, Hughes & Strachan remains a related coachbuilder and is not merged into the Aberdonia marque.

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