Wheels Australia — August 2016

160 WheelsMag.com.au

1

Retro

Series

1937

Franc-ly skint

In his last days, Louis

Delâge settled in the small

village of Le Pecq, walking

or cycling to church as he

couldn’t afford a car

WORDS MICHAEL STAHL

Fast

&

f

a

c

t

u

la

05

LOUIS Delâge was a French carmaker in the way you’d have a French

carmaker be. Born in 1874 as the son of a stationmaster, he studied

engineering at a prestigious college and, like W.O. Bentley, kicked off

his career as a railway engineer.

Then he turned to car-making, produced advanced and timelessly

elegant machines, became a rich and randy Parisian playboy, went

bust, and died poor.

Delâge founded his car-making concern in 1905, initially producing

tiny voiturettes powered by single-cylinder de Dion engines. He was

quick to recognise the value of motorsport and a victory in a grand prix

at Dieppe in 1908 had the orders flowing in.

His road cars got bigger, faster and more glamorous, supported by

further racing success. However, neither racing success nor production

of more than 1000 of his four-cylinder cars per year made Louis Delâge

super-rich. But the Great War did, with Delâge factories converted to

produce munitions.

Through the 1920s, Delâge’s six-cylinder cars were among the top

rank in terms of performance, luxury and styling, the latter by a variety

of French coachbuilders. And Monsieur Delâge, who sported a glass eye

(the result of a childhood accident), was quite the rake around Paris.

In 1929 Delâge launched his masterpiece, the D8, powered by a

4.0-litre straight-eight. As would befall compatriot Ettore Bugatti’s

Royale, however, this extravagance coincided with the Great

Depression. The D8 was supplemented by smaller models, but in 1935

Delâge was effectively merged with Delahaye.

The D8-120 of 1937-40 was the product of this marriage, using a

modified Delahaye chassis and a 4.7-litre straight-eight derived from a

Delahaye six. Aside from its more than competent touring performance

and handling, the D8-120 became known for gorgeous bodies by

coachbuilders such as Chapron, Saoutchik and Letourneur et Marchand.

The latter provided the elegant Aérosport Coupe on these pages. This

particular example, which sold for more than a million dollars seven

years ago, is one of only a dozen believed built and spent several years

in Australia after World War II.

While this car decayed Down Under, the Delâge marque sadly did the

same. Delahaye had given the bum’s rush to the dandy Louis Delâge,

who died poor and little-remembered in 1947. Six-cylinder cars were

produced after WW2, but Delâge ended along with Delahaye in 1954.

Tanked

The D8-120’s straigh

eight engine did duty

in the Hotchkiss H39

fast-reconnaissance

light tank during WW

DELAGE D8-120 81

A dashing Frenchman left behind this classic as his legacy

t

W2