The name Rolls-Royce is synonymous with anything and everything classy. You think of rich dark leather, fine timbers and even ivory fittings. The paint work alone seems to be thicker than the metal on some modern cars. Then there's the engines, so quiet and refined you could balance a cup of tea on the bonnet without stirring a ripple. Or perhaps, being a Roller, that should be a flute of sparking Moet.

Then you have David Lear's Rolls-Royce. It's a 1927 20 hp – and looks it's age. It is worn and tired, the paint is chipped and dulled the timber coatings are cracking and the ivory has little hairline fractures that tell of a life unknown in the colony of Australia – no place surely for Britain's finest. As I recall, being of convict stock, Australia was populated by some of Britain's not-so-finest.

So this lady of leisure somehow found her way down-under for what turned out to be an explosive career – literally. David says the car was sold new as a sedan in England. Her past for the next few decades is unknown. It was purchased around 1955 in Sydney by a Mr Stan Nash for around 850 pounds. Mr Nash apparently replaced the tourer shell with the cabriolet body.

“He apparently was a dynamite salesman and used the car accordingly,” said David. He owned the car for three of four years before it was again sold and the three quarter style cabriolet body fitted. This body resembles closely the Maddox style of bodies fitted in the UK. It is worth noting that in the 1920s the 20/25 cars were sold by Rolls-Royce as engine and chassis only with the owner selecting the body builders to fit a style to order.

The car at some stage blew the engine and it is believed spent around 40 years unused and garaged until it came up for auction in Sydney. David says he `accidentally' put his hand up at the auction and became an instant Rolls-Royce owner a couple of years back. He has no plans to restore the car.

He says the car is very refined to drive. As the owner of several 1920s cars - including two Amilcars and a Vauxhall – he is accustomed to driving this vintage of automobile. The Rolls-Royce Twenty was build between 1922 and 1929 and was Rolls' small car entrant alongside the giant of the time: the 40/50 Silver Ghost and it's replacement the Phantom.

It was powered by a new in-line six cylinder engine of 3127 cc which had a separate head. The earlier cars has a three speed gearbox with a change lever in the centre of the car and later – as in David's car – they were given a four speed gearbox with a right hand change. This can be seen in the interior photograph. A torque tube was used to transmit power to the back axle.

The chassis had rigid front and rear axles suspended by half elliptic springs. At first the car only had rear brakes, but this was changed in 1925 to brakes all round and you can see the front brake drums through the wire wheels. The car was fitted with Rolls-Royce famous radiator with the triangular top with the grille changing three times over the life of the car: first it had enamel-finished horizontal slats, then these were given a nickel finish and finally vertical slats.