Opel 10/40 PS

The Opel 10/40 PS is a Open topped 4 door 4/5 seat “Tourenwagen” / 2-door 4/5 seat “Stadt-Coupé” (City coupé) / 4-door 4/5 seat “Limousine” (saloon/sedan) / Long wheel base open topped 4 door 6/7 seat “T from Opel, built from 1925 to 1929, the vintage years, when coachbuilders still shaped most of what was sold. Under the bonnet: 2620&nbsp.

The story

The Opel 10/40 PS is a luxury car manufactured by Opel. The car was introduced in May 1925 as the Opel 10/50 PS, but by the time production got underway in July 1925 it had become the Opel 10/45 PS, and it very soon thereafter became the Opel 10/40 PS, a name which it retained throughout the rest of a production run which lasted until November 1929. The name followed the widely used German naming convention of the time whereby the first digit – here "10" represented the engine's tax horsepower (Steuer-PS) (effectively, in the case of German cars of the period, a linear function of the engine capacity) and the second digit represented the manufacturer's estimate of the actual horsepower. The design of the car consciously followed the example of Opel 4/14 PS, being a paragon of engineering simplicity designed for ease of manufacture. The engine was a 2620 cc four-cylinder unit for which (after a few months of heightened optimism) the manufacturer quoted a maximum output of 40 PS (29 kW; 39 hp) at 2,800 rpm.

This converted into a listed top speed of 85 km/h (53 mph) on the standard length car, and 80 km/h (50 mph) on the heavier long wheelbase version. Most cars came with a 3,000 mm (120 in) wheelbase, intended for 4/5 seater bodywork. A longer 3,250 mm (128 in) wheelbase was also offered for 6/7 seater bodywork. At launch in 1925 the car was priced by Opel in bare chassis form at 7,000 Marks for the standard wheelbase length and 7,600 Marks for the long wheelbase. By 1928 these prices had almost halved to 3,750 Marks and 4,000 Marks respectively. For customers happy

What is underneath

Power comes from 2620  other versions carried different engines, listed in the specification table below. It shifts through a 3-speed manual. The layout matters: a front engine drives the rear wheels, the classic proportion — long bonnet, cabin set back — that most people picture when they picture a sports saloon or a grand tourer. The wheelbase is 3000 mm or / 3250 mm. These are manufacturer figures carried by Wikipedia and Wikidata, not road-test measurements.

Its place in the line

Its family tree is legible: assembly was at Rüsselsheim, Germany. Its contemporaries in the catalogue — the Tatra 17, the Bugatti type 30 torpédo, the Chrysler Chrysler — show what else the money bought that year. Nearby in the Opel catalogue sit the Opel Sintra and the Opel K-180.

What it costs now

MotorJury scores cars on the United States complaint and recall record, and the Opel 10/40 PS has none: too old, too rare, or never sold there. Its value today is a collector's question, decided by provenance and condition rather than by a class average.