40a and 158 Riley Saloon (1947-55) possible variation

A good friend and fellow Dinky collector/restorer sent me the two photos shown below. This is a Riley Saloon, which he bought on eBay, with the intent to restore. The second photo shows it restored, along with another vintage Riley, also restored in the same color. Notice that the first one has only part of the license plate area...nothing below the front bumper. The second one shows what is normally present. He said upon inspecting it prior to the restoration, that it did not appear to him to have been modified....also one would wonder why someone might remove the lower part of the plate. The question then is, has anyone else seen this? I looked through all of my Dinky references and did not see this even mentioned. Comments please!! And no, he did not take any other photos of the original model, and it does have the small lettering on the baseplate. Terry s929.photobucket.com/user/thardgrave/media/English ] s929.photobucket.com/user/thardgrave/media/English%20Dinky ]

I have four of these
and they all have the ' complete ' number plate.I do not remember seeing one with a smaller version Dave

Hi Terry,
Interesting ! Just checked my five
and all have the full plate,
right across the age range too,
so one to look out for ! Cheers Chris Warr,

Here is a 40a Trade Box with six Riley Saloons [img] / images / sites / default / files / old - forum - images / 40a_Riley_Saloon_TB.jpg [/img] All six cars have the ' complete ' number plate Dave

Both mine (
large
and small lettering
) have the full size numberplate.Peculiar.

Terry Unless I need to have my eyes examined,
but the shape of the windscreen looks different,
more square,
and the model appears to be sitting lower than the one on the left.Bruce

BruceI will have to ask my friend to bring both of them next time we meet,
so I can look at them closely.It is important to realize that both of these have now been restored,
although I doubt he did more than strip
and paint them,
so I will look at that windscreen area to double check that.With regard to that smaller front license plate area.....we are both now of the opinion that a previous owner must have filed it off for some reason.He looked at it very carefully prior to restoring it,
and did not see anything obvious,
but the fact that no one else has ever seen this also lends credence to it being modified.Terry

Checking my Rileys,
I found one with the smaller numberplate.It is the green one in the middle,
play worn,
but not tampered with.No filing to the underside of the numberplate.It featured in the wheel variations thread because of its red wheels.It has small letters on the baseplate.Could well be a variation.I have an early full trade box which I have not checked yet.Rob [img] / images / sites / default / files / old - forum - images / 40a_Rileys_2_Forum.jpg [/img]

Rob --Thanks for posting this, and possibly verifying that the variation did exist. I had about given up, and thought that possibly one of the previous owners had filed it off, but when my friend first received it, is still had it's original finish on it, and it would seem odd to file off the license plate bottom, but not re-paint model. We should confirm the bases of these two to see if they appear to be from the same time frame...would guess so! I would think Jacques might like to include a photo in his Dinky Encyclopedia. Terry

Blimey Oh Riley ! :laugh: CW.

I would certainly
add
this variation to the Encyclopaedia if Rob could send me a large photo with possibly only two of the Rileys
and better light on the dark green one.Thank you Rob.

Photo by courtesy of Dave Busfield. While reading the excelent last issue of 'THE JOURNAL', I looked at my Encyclopaedia and found two more pictures of the Riley without a number plate. I suppose that this confirms the variation.