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Lets go back to how the name ROVER came about .

It was all started by John Kemp Starley (Thumbnail above standing beside a specially prepared 16/50 which made several appearances at Brooklands in the late 1920's, lapping at over 100mph) who was born in Walthamstow in 1855 and received his apprenticeship in Coventry. He started his own company in 1887 with William Sutton for the manufacture of penny-farthing bicycles, and later tricycles. At the height of the great bicycling boom, the partnership was dissolved and the company was reformed as Starley and Co.Ltd.

"J.K.S" did not take out the patents for the "safety bicycle," but he was the earliest and most Famous pioneer of centrally mounted pedals. Which drove the rear wheels by chain. He called his bicycle the Rover"safety" model.

Production mounted prodigiously, and it was famed throughout the world for its lightness convenience and security. Some twenty years later explorers in distant Tibet found one already there.

While Carl Benz was still conducting his experiments with the horseless carriage, Starley in 1888 designed and manufactured a motorised tricycle with a horizontal electric engine under the seat, but production was not until two years after his death in 1901 that the company began the manufacture of its first motor bicycle

By 1904 the rover cycle company was giving serious attention to the manufacture of motor cars E.W.Lewis was now the chief designer and in April of that year a hint of the wind of change was to be witnessed in the announcement of the Rover carburettor.

"The principle to a certain extent is novel, in that not only is the additional air admission regulated, but that passing the jet is also regulated in volume and velocity." 

The journalist A.J.Wilson, who had one fitted to his car, at once noticed the difference. Driving home from Coventry to London, I found that there was an improvement of quite twenty percent in the power of my engine; on the top speed I romped up hills..." The prototype 8 h.p.(below), as we have seen , made its debut a few months later.     

Production began soon afterwards, and this model which according to car illustrated "set quite a new fashion," and, according to the autocar " is unique in design in many respects," was an instant success. It was sold as a two seater for £200 and as a three seater at £220; the export model possessing greater strength and ground clearance cost £225. Until the late 1920's, Rovers continued to list a simple, robust and well made economy model possessing many ultra-advanced features.

Encoraged by the unexpected success of their small eight and six, the Rover company was quick to widen the range of their motor cars, while continuing to develop their profitable and well-considered cycle and motor cycle business. The four-cylinder car was the obvious next step. And the 97 x 110mm. "Twenty" brought fame to the name by its competition success. In 1907 the tourist trophy race round the Isle of man was already recognised as the major British motor competition of the year.

The victory by the Hon. Charles Rolls the previous year had brought much prestige to the still-infant Rolls-Royce Company. On May 30th, 1907, once again the cars set off in a dour drizzle round the 401/2-mile circuit. They were divided into two classes, those in the heavy touring class being encumbered by an enormous vertical screen intend to simulate a contemporary limousine body. The two 20 h.p. Rovers qualified for the tourist trophy proper, and E. court's car running with splendid regularity, covered the 2411/2 miles at an average speed of 28.8 m.p.h. to lead the way home, while the favourites dropped out one by one through fuel shortage or engines swamped by the continuous downpour.

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