
Snapshot 451 on the 1930 Invicta NLC left us with a mystery: what on earth does NLC stand for? Initial enquiries by Peter McFadyen (who kindly took and sent us the photo) got a response from the knowledgeable Invicta experts: “We don’t know!” That, of course, made Peter even more determined. He got hold of the owner of the car in our Snapshot, Philip Milne-Taylor, who dug into the matter and discovered the truth. Philip said:
“Finally got confirmation about the meaning of the Invicta being called the NLC; the consensus say it stood for New Large Chassis. The original 1.5ltr cars were SC (Standard chassis). The 3ltr when introduced were then LC’s which stood for large chassis. When the Meadows 4.5ltr engine was put into the 3ltr chassis it was found not to be strong or rigid enough, so a new chassis was designed that therefore was then called the New Large Chassis.”
A mystery solved. Our thanks go to Peter and Philip.
I can see from that picture where Gordon Crosby got the inspiration for the Railton radiator