Anything on four wheels named Rolls-Royce is usually expensive to buy – and pricey to maintain and keep running. This 1976 Silver Shadow was drivable until an attempt to remove and repair the automatic transmission went south, so the seller is presenting it as a project/parts car in salvage condition. Located in Sequoyah Hills, Tennessee, this once stately luxury automobile is being offered at the cheap wheels price of $1,776 here on craigslist. Another interesting tip from Chuck Foster!
The Silver Shadow was built across two generations from 1965 to 1980. It was the first time that the esteemed company used unit-body construction. In the 16 years of hand-built production, 30,000 Shadows were manufactured, which exceeded that of any other Rolls-Royce product. A Bentley-badged version was also assembled for a time. These regal machines used a 6,750-cc L410 V8 engine paired with GM’s TH-400 automatic transmission.
The seller has had the Rolls for five years and used it regularly until the tranny developed issues. An “aborted attempt to remove and reseal” said gearbox did not turn out well, so this car is a roller now (we assume the needy piece is still around and comes with the sale). The odometer reading is 93,000 miles suggesting it has served the “lifestyles of the rich and famous” for at least part of its life. While the interior looks passable, the burgundy paint has seen better days, perhaps from sitting around outdoors. The seller has priced it to match the year that the car was born – novel! Is this a project you’d want to undertake?
Since the transmission is a GM unit, I can’t imagine it can’t be repaired (or even replaced) fairly easily.
Some other components may be more difficult, and certainly more expensive. Time wears out some items when mileage doesn’t. Even so, I’m guessing this car could be rehabilitated (and repainted) for less than you’d pay for a fully sorted example.
But I also have to say Shadows are nice drivers. They can be hustled along enjoyably, and of course are superb cruisers.
Its something to think that Rolls Royce though so much of the THM 400 that they used it in their cars.
AMC thought a lot of the TH 400 too, using it behind 258 I6, 304, 360, and 401 V8s in their Jeeps!
Jaguar also used it in the XJS and XJ12.
Few things are more expensive than a cheap British car
Listing has been deleted.
Shame but this fine car is pretty much guaranteed to be parted out for spares. “The sum of all parts is worth more than the whole”; with apologies to Mr Aristotle!
Nothing is more expensive than a cheap Rolls Royce” A TH 400 rebuild is cheap enough, unless RR did something nuts to the trans.
Perhaps the issue was in the electric shift controls. ( in that case, convert it to a T Bar with a Lokar shifter)
And lose the steering wheel that would better suit a London cab
I owned one of these for 30 years. Nice car if you can keep it sorted. That trans was allegedly gone through by Rolls Royce to make it smoother and more robust. Never heard of one going bad but the electric shifting unit was sensitive to moisture. I can see someone being sick enough of the constant, costly maintenance to just want it hauled away.
I wonder if a big block Chev motor would fit easily? I know they fit in XJS cars.
Apparently there have been several modified to GM engine. The worst part of these cars is the hydraulic system. Enormously complex, unreliable and expensive. I’ve been told GM braking systems work well as replacements.
The Rolls Royce community considers it sacrilege to modify the cars in any way. You would be the subject of endless shame and ridicule. Haha!
Thats good to know about the brakes. Seems like an easy upgrade to GM 4 wheel discs, I would think C3 Corvette stuff would work.
I have spare 479″ BB Chev motor and have been considering an older RR as a host for it, with a 4L80 auto trans
I doubt I would ever even speak to The Rolls Royce community, who cares what they think? The big block chevy idea works for me, and the rest of the upgrades would be a fun challenge to adapt them to this car. Power brakes, steering, windows, A/C, etc. What’s retirement for anyways?
My shop had several Rolls-Royces with other drive trains towed in for repairs. Most were GM big block engines, and the conversions didn’t take into account the high pressure hydraulic system used in the brakes AND suspension.
The R-R and B cars use twin high pressure hydraulic pumps on the camshaft to provide Castrol DOT4 brake fluid [later cars use mineral oil] under 2,500 psi -yes 2,500 psi, that is stored in 2 nitrogen filled spheres where it is metered out to the SIX 4-piston calipers thru a 3rd brake hydraulic system, using a non-power assisted master cylinder to provide the brake pedal “feel” and as a backup brake system. The 2 main hydraulic systems use a set of delicate sliding valves to distribute the high pressure fluid to the calipers.
When working correctly, it’s possible to let a Rolls-Royce sit unused for 6 months, and without starting the engine, put the car in neutral, let it roll out of the garage, and still have full power brakes, at lease enough for a couple of full pedal applications.
25 years ago when we worked on the cars, we were not able to find any suitable DOT4 brake fluid certified pumps that worked at 2,500 psi, matched the minimum flow rates, and fit under the hood, much less be driven off a drive belt. [Don’t forget it takes 2 pumps.]
The standard steel 4-door Shadow is about 3 tons, and the longer wheelbase cars are heavier. While truck calipers and discs had the weight situation covered, those parts were too big to fit the available space using the standard 15″ rims.
In several instances of trying to rectify someone else’s attempts to change drivelines and/or brakes, we ended up buying the car for spare parts. In each case, the costs to make the car run and stop in a safe manner, even at our lower rates, the repairs exceeded the value of the car, and the owners elected to cut their losses.
THE COSTS TO DO ALL THE CONVERSIONS CAN EASILY EXCEED THE COSTS [NOT INCLUDING AN ENGINE OVERHAUL] OF FIXING THE STANDARD ROLLS-ROYCE SYSTEMS!
Anyone wanting a Rolls-Royce Silver Shadow or Spirit is advised to join the Rolls-Royce Owner’s Club, and thru the club members find an independent shop capable of repairing the cars. Many of the club members are not wealthy, and have found good shops. And buy a set of repair manuals. [A full set of repair manuals for my Silver Spur was about 8″ tall when stacked on top of each other!]
Pretty sure they already had GM power steering and A/C. I’m certain they used GM components for the smog controls.
Yes, Power steering and A/C parts were from GM, but are not interchangeable with other GM cars, except for the A/C compressor [it does have minor differences, but the larger GM swash plate compressor works fine]. The other A/C parts were mostly supplied by Harrison Division of GM, but not used in GM vehicles.
The power steering is Rolls-Royce only, built by Saginaw to R-R specifications. The steering box on Shadows can be rebuilt using GM seals & bushings. We simply sent them out to a local hydraulic rebuilder.
The use of American made parts for Rolls-Royce dates back to WW2, when Packard made about 9,000 V12 Rolls-Royce Merlin aircraft engines as used in the Spitfire and P-51 Mustang fighter planes. Packard was not only able to ramp up production levels 10-fold, but the company improved the Merlin engine in many ways. This paved the way for Rolls-Royce to use the GM Hydra-matic starting in 1953, rather than develop their own automatic gearbox, something the company certainly had the ability to do.
When considering various avenues in choosing what to do for an automatic gearbox, R-R engineers took note of the Hydra-matic’s use in large WW2 US Army trucks in combat situations, and also for US M5 Stuart tank drivetrains. If it could hold up in combat, it could certainly do well in Rolls-Royce vehicles.
To heck with the RR. Just go get a nice Cadillac and you’ll have a better car.
I’ve came close to pulling the trigger on a couple of these. Have to keep up with a buddy of mine with a R title Bently. Found one and called Rolls Dealer (60 miles away) and talked to Service Manager about servicing/inspecting it. Said that Rolls dealers only “service what they sell”, meaning your on your own. Quickly deleted that car from consideration.
Wes,
If the factory heard that claim of only servicing what they sell, they would quicky be reminded that they cannot turn down a vehicle for that reason.
That said, as someone who operated a Rolls-Royce & Bentley independent repair & restoration shop, I know the real reason he wasn’t keen on working on the car; It’s age. His facility would rather work on the more modern cars, and forget the Shadow and earlier vehicles. Because of the high costs of spare parts, dealers generally don’t keep the 1980s and earlier parts in stock. So when an older car needs spare parts, it’s gonna be a few days [at a minimum] to get parts, potentially tying up a valuable repair bay during the wait.
And there is one more reason lurking in the dark that they don’t like to bring up: Owners of late modern Rolls-Royce cars have lots of money to spend on their cars. Most owners of 30 year old [and older] Rolls-Royces usually have to watch how much money they spend on the car.
The service manager at the Rolls-Royce dealer in my area was a long-time friend, and he would often suggest [on the owner balking at the high costs of repair] he call my shop. And we had a running joke that if an owner of a modern Rolls-Royce asked us to work on their car, I would suggest they call him!
I new a rolls rep in the 70’s and he said they sent trans repairs over to the local GM dealer. It’s just a 400, everybody then worked on these. He always laughed when he told that story.
Knew. Not new. Thanks spellcheck
I’ve been out of the loop for about 25 years, so I’m not familiar with the newer examples, but the older Rolls-Royce GM gearbox was a standard unit, except that some of the parts had a higher degree of precision, and they were assembled in batches with more attention to details and precision fit. Major changes like the addition of the electrical shifting unit on the left side of the trans case was done in England. The electrical shifting system was chosen to eliminate RHD and LHD shifter linkages, the difference now being limited to a different wiring harness only.
Have the same transmission in my old Caddy. Lots of money wasted by previous owner and me because of shift issues, turned out to be the engine control module, $169 Rock auto, easy fix. Needed sophisticated diagnosis. Easy fix.
That’s the trouble with cars today, nobody can work on them. I’ll stick to the 60’s so I can work on them. Most of the mechanics today don’t know about cars that are fifty or sixty years old anyway. Had that trouble with my 83 Lincoln not too long ago. Nobody could regulate the idle speed so I ended up studying the service manual for the car and found out how to do it. Worked fine after that and all I did was turn a screw on the carb about 3/4 of a turn.