He owned a Rolls Royce for 77 years, 2.75 lakh km without a single breakdown!

Rolls Royce is definitely a brand that resonates with a lot of people but is only within the reach of a few. Many people take the Rolls Royce on rent on ridiculously high prices just to experience the car. The reason behind it largely depends on the kind of quality that the car provides. Its flawless craftsmanship is proven by an old 1928 Rolls Royce Phantom. It’ll also surprise you as to how the car even after so many years, today is in perfect running condition. It was owned by Late Mr M Allen Swift of West Hartford, Connecticut.

Mr Allen Swift maintains the record of owning the Rolls Royce for the longest time in the history of the car. He has owned the Phantom for 77 years and for that Rolls Royce presented him with a crystal Spirit of Ecstasy as a sign of recognition.

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Allen Swift was born in 1903 which was the era of the rapidly rising automobile industry around the world. This obviously led him to be keen to know more and more about automobiles. At the age of 24, he bought his first car which was a 1917 Franklin. Then he went on to buy a Marmon as his second car. Then at the age of 26, he was gifted the Rolls Royce by his father for staying with the family business. This sacrifice by Allen to work at this young age, allowed his younger brothers to continue their education. As a reward, his father asked him to choose any car he wants. As quoted by him during an interview in 2003 in the Springfield Museum, he said that the main reason he chose Rolls Royce was that he was impressed with the rigorous testing of the Rolls Royce cars in the Springfield plant.

“Someone had advised me to go to the Springfield plant, I went all through it and watched them making the parts. It reinforced my idea that it was well made. I saw all the ways they tested the cars. Every engine was tested. Then when they got the engine finished, they set it up on a concrete block and ran it a specified number of times and a specified number of hours. Someone would come around periodically with a stethoscope and listen to it and so forth. Then it was completely dismantled and checked and reassembled and put back in to the chassis. Then a bench was mounted on the chassis, and a test driver drove it 200 miles before it was released.”

Allen also had a unique choice of colour going with a Piccadily body finish in dual-tone Green. The chassis of Allen’s Rolls Royce Phantom was made by the Brewster & Co. Coachworks, NY which was one of the best chassis makers in the world.

Rolls Royce cars are made for life

The 1928 Rolls Royce never stopped working and was always in a fixable condition when things went wrong like any other car, however it had a full body restoration and engine rebuild in 1988. It only required regular oil changes and maintenance. Some of it was done by Allen himself.

The Rolls Royce Phantom is still in production and is a popular choice amongst famous personalities around the world. It has an extreme luxurious touch to it. It is also claimed that it has the quietest cabin amongst any other car and it has double laminated windows. There is also 130 kgs of sound insulation to make sure there is absolutely no noise from the outside. It is powered with a 6.75-litre V12 twin-turbo petrol engine that can generate 571 PS of maximum power. The torque peaks at 900 Nm. Even though this makes the car as heavy as 2.6-tonnes, it can do a 0-100kmph in just 5.4 seconds. In India, Rolls Royce Phantom is priced at Rs. 9 Crore ex-showroom and the Extended Wheelbase variant at by Rs. 11 Crores ex-showroom.

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