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Riley 1½ Falcon. (1936-37)

1936 Riley 12/4 Falcon ASC962

After falling sales through the 1936 season, the Falcon was relaunched for 1937 with the Briggs Body, used the previous year for the Merlin. However, despite using the narrow 12/4 chassis, rather than the smaller Melrin type chassis, and boasting higher specifications, the public were not convinced, and the Falcon, once the mainstay of the 12/4 range, slipped quietly away at the end of the year. Surprisingly, perhaps, it acheived nearly 600 sales during the year, but compared to the combined total of around 1200 for the Merlin and Falcon in the previous two years, this was not enough, especially as Briggs bodies started to build up at the factory.
For 1938, the Falcon was replaced by the new Touring Saloon, itself another version of the Briggs Body, hastily designed to try and shift more cars. Indeed, the model used the '28F' chassis prefix, indicating that Riley considered it to be a Falcon replacement - other versions used the 'B' or 'C' prefixes. Furthermore, many dealers sold it as a Falcon, partly in order to gain repeat sales, and partly perhaps through ignorance of the changes.

Chassis Types: (S/SS) 27F