Rolls-Royce Phantom III cars have been converted to hearses and shooting brakes. In 1964, more than 20 years after the end of production, the villainous Auric Goldfinger (played by Gert Fröbe) drove an excellently preserved black and yellow Phantom III (Chassis Number #3BU168 Sedanca de Ville by Coachbuilder Barker), knowing that its great strength would be able to hold the weight of the vast amounts of gold that he smuggled around Europe. Rolls-Royce Phantom III The Rolls-Royce Phantom III was the final large pre-war Rolls-Royce. Introduced in 1936, it replaced the Phantom II and it was the only V12 Rolls-Royce until the 1998
Rolls-Royce Limited the specialist coachbuilders completely in-house by buying the remaining capital of Park Ward Limited which since 1936 in conjunction with Rolls-Royce had been building short production runs of all-metal saloon bodies on Bentley chassis. In 1959 Rolls-Royce bought coachbuilder H J Mulliner and the two businesses were put together as H J Mulliner Park Ward. Luxury cars did not fit with the new mood of postwar austerity. After starting design and development of what became their C series diesel engine range in 1948 Rolls-Royce began to produce diesel engines in 1951. By 1955 it provided diesel engines for automotive, railway,