Pelland Engineering

A Pellandine Steam Cat in an Adelaides car museum .

Pelland Engineering is a British kit car manufacturer based in Thetford (Norfolk) from 1979 to the 1990s . Founder and owner was Peter Pellandine , who had operated a comparable company called Pellandini Cars in Australia until 1978 .

Pelland Sports

Pellandine launched the Sports , a car based on the steam car previously made in Australia . The two-seater sport had the drive of the VW Beetle , which was installed as a mid-engine . This should improve the dynamic properties of the car. The monocoque body was made of GRP . The front axle with stabilizer was taken over from VW and the rear axle hung on a transverse leaf spring designed by Pellandine himself. The car was generally designed as a roadster , but there was a hardtop with wing doors .

The construction was sold to Ryder Cars in Coventry (Warwickshire) in 1980 . This company brought out the car as Rembrandt and researched whether it was possible to replace the VW boxer engine with a mid-engine Kent engine with a cross-flow cylinder head. This company was later sold to Graham Autos in Tyneside . Both of the companies mentioned built only a few copies and after a while the construction was sold to Listair .

Listair revised the design in the late 1980s and released the new vehicle as Dash . On request, there was also a version with an Alfasud engine .

In 1990 Dash Sports Cars in Chesterwood (Hereford) took over the project.

In 1996/1997 Dash sold the construction to Richard Bell , who moved to Dana Point , California . Bell still owns three copies of the car today and is continuing research into the history of the model.

Chris Evans , who lives near Inverness , is the owner, secretary and treasurer of the Pelland Rembrandt Register . The club has only a few members, but by April 2009 tracked nineteen surviving copies of the car. Evans himself owns five cars, two of which are completely drivable, two are being restored and one is being prepared for the acceptance of molds for new GRP bodies. This last derivative of the original construction will be a little larger and more practical in use, but should retain the character of Peter Pellandine's original.

The Dash demonstrator and molds were given to Mel Hubbard of Manx Buggies in Norfolk .

Pellandine Steam Cat

With the Pellandine Steam Cat brought from Australia, Pellandine wanted to break the world speed record for steam-powered land vehicles, which stood at 205.45 km / h. He tried this several times, but was repeatedly thrown back by technical problems. The last attempt was in 1991. This was followed by the historic cars at Christie's sold and can in Lakeland Motor Museum in Holker Hall in -in-Cartmel Cark in the county of Cumbria be visited.

Pelland Sports Mark II

In 1989 Peter Pellandine brought out a completely new version of the Pelland Sport. This car also had a GRP body, but was equipped with a chassis with double wishbones and was powered by a mid-mounted Alfasud engine. There was both a roadster and a coupé with normal folding doors instead of the wing doors from the previous model. The road holding of the vehicle was described in the magazine Kitcar International as "superb".

In the 1990s Pellandine returned to Australia to further develop his steam car.

Web links

Commons : Pellandine - collection of images, videos and audio files

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GN Georgano: Complete Encyclopedia of Motorcars: 1885 to present . (1982)
Haydn Davis & Ian Hyne: The Kitcars International Guide to Kit Cars and Their Values 1964 to 1991 . (1991)