Reliant: Regal
Note: This is a sub-section of Reliant.
- Regal MK1-V1 1952-62
- Regal 3/25,3/30 1962-73
The Reliant Regal was a small three-wheeled car manufactured by the Reliant Motor Company in Tamworth, England. Being a three-wheeler, and lightweight, the vehicle could be driven on a motorcycle licence in the United Kingdom.
There were many forms of Reliant Regal from the Mk 1 in 1953 followed by the Mk II, Mk III, Mk IV, Mk V, Mk VI and the Regal 21/E, 3/25 and 3/30.
Sales levels were never 'world class'. The Regal 3/25 version was introduced in October 1962: on 25 April 1968, a year before BMC celebrated their 2,000,000th Mini, Reliant sales director, T. H. Scott, personally drove the 50,000th Regal 3/25 off the assembly line at Reliant's Tamworth plant.
A few months later, in August 1968, it was reported that the 701 cc engine which had been introduced in the Reliant: Rebel the previous autumn had found its way into the Regal. In the three wheeler application the compression ratio was lowered to 7.5:1 which will have reduced the power output - in this application to a claimed 29.5 bhp. Nevertheless, this still represented a useful increase over the 26 bhp claimed for the 600 cc Regal which this version replaced.
Sources of Information
- [1] Wikipedia