1948 Talbot-Lago T26 Record

In 1896, in Suresnes a western suburb of Paris, Alexandre Darracq started his business, A Darracg & Cie. His business was building road and racecars. Darracq would go on to become famous for the success of his racecars.

But by 1912, Darracq had sold off what remained of his business. In 1913 Darracq retired after years of difficulty that almost bankrupted the company. In 1916, ownership of the company was transferred to Darracq S.A. Then, in 1922, the Darracq name was dropped and the business was renamed Talbot S.A. Under this new guise, road going cars bore the name Talbot, while competition cars still carried the name Talbot-Darracq.

In 1932, during the depression, Antoni Lago was appointed managing director in hope that he would bring Talbot back from the brink of collapse. However, the owners were unable to stay afloat and in 1936, Lago bought the company from receivership, now renaming it Talbot-Lago.

After WWII, Talbot-Lago continued to have a good reputation for racecars and luxury passenger cars, but the company had a tough time finding customers and money was tight.

In 1946, Talbot-Lago started production on a new engine design that featured an overhead-valve head with hemispherical combustion chambers. The design team, led by Carlo Marchetti, had in many ways created a new motor that was used to power Talbot-Lago’s successful Grand Prix monoposto and  later Louis Rosier’s 1950 Le Mans winner. In keeping with Talbot-Lago tradition, this state-of-the-art power unit was also used for the company’s road cars, the Talbot-Lago Record and Grand Sport. These cars were in direct competition with creations from Delage,   Delahaye and Hotchkiss, but Talbot was able to remain in business as the other companies fell by the wayside.

The T26 Record had a power output of 170 hp and a claimed top speed of 105 mph, making it one of the most powerful cars of the post-war era, only to be outdone by its slightly more powerful stable-mate the Grand Sport. The Record was offered with either a four-speed manual transmission or the optional Wilson pre-selector box. The Record was commonly sold as a rather conservative 4-door sedan, but some were lucky enough to be turned into open, two-door grand touring cars by Coachbuilder Graber of Bern, Switzerland.

Graber created a very modern and clean design to skin the Talbot’s chassis, while the factory bodied sedan of the same period had an antiquated look by comparison.

This is a large touring car with a sporting nature. You can fit four sporting friends, five if they are really friendly. Everything is big and grand with the Talbot. You open a large door and climb into large leather seats. There’s nothing delicate about the Record, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t have an aura of elegance.

This Record doesn’t make do with a standard shift as it has the optional Wilson pre-selector gearbox, in which the epicyclic gear trains are engaged and disengaged by brake bands operated by a pedal that occupies the space where you would normally find the clutch pedal. You manually selected the next brake band to be actuated, and therefore the next gear ratio, so you pre-plan your shifts, place it in the gear you want, then press the peddle when you are ready to change gears. It feels a bit counterintuitive, but you get the hang of it after a while.

The dash is clean and simple with two large circular dials for the speedometer and tachometer a series of small rectangular dials handle the rest. The wheel is a substantial piece and helps to smooth out the bumps.

This is the perfect car for the open road, like Paris to Monaco. It will do fine on the back roads of New York, Connecticut, or California. But if you are going to grand tour, tour grandly!

Specifications