Lanchester armoured car

The Lanchester armoured car was a British armoured car built on the chassis of the Lanchester Sporting Forty that saw wide service with the Royal Naval Air Service and British Army in the First World War, the second most numerous armoured car in British service after the Rolls-Royce. Its engine sat beside the driver's feet, allowing better sloped frontal armour than the Rolls-Royce, and its standard Admiralty pattern turret mounted a single .303 Vickers machine gun. The monobloc six cylinder engine gave 60 hp and the car had a pre-selective epicyclic gearbox, strengthened rear cantilever springs and double rear wheels. The prototype was built at Dunkirk in December 1914 and production followed from early 1915. About 36 formed the nucleus of Commander Locker-Lampson's force in Russia, which drove over 53,000 miles, much further than any other First World War vehicles.