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British motor vehicle manufacturer
the English motor vehicle manufacturer

Crossley Motors was an English motor vehicle manufacturer based in Manchester, England. It produced approximately 19,000 cars from 1904 until 1938, 5,500 buses from 1926 until 1958, and 21,000 goods and military vehicles from 1914 to 1945. Crossley Brothers, originally manufacturers of textile machinery and rubber processing plant, began the licensed manufacture of the Otto internal combustion engine before 1880. The firm started car production in 1903, building around 650 vehicles in their first year. The company was established as a division of engine builders Crossley Brothers, but from 1910 became a stand alone company. Although founded as a car maker, they were major suppliers of vehicles to British Armed Forces during World War I, and in the 1920s moved into bus manufacture. With re armament in the 1930s, car making was run down, and stopped completely in 1936. During World War II output was again concentrated on military vehicles. Bus production resumed in 1945 but no more cars were made. The directors decided in the late 1940s that the company was too small to survive alone and agreed to a takeover by AEC. Production at the Crossley factories finally stopped in 1958.

Crossley Motors Ltd was first registered on 11 April 1906 (and re registered with a different company number in 1910) as the vehicle manufacturing arm of Crossley Brothers. The first car was actually built in 1903 to a design by James S. Critchley, who had been with Daimler and exhibited at the Society of Motor Manufacturers' Exhibition at Crystal Palace in February 1904, but the parent company saw a future for these new machines and decided a separate company was required. In 1920, Crossley Motors bought 34,283 (68.5%) of the 50,000 issued shares of the nearby firm of Avro. Crossley took over Avro's car manufacturing business and Avro continued its aircraft manufacturing operations independently. In 1928, Crossley had to sell its shares in Avro to Armstrong Siddeley to pay for the losses incurred by the Willys Overland Crossley venture. After World War II, the directors decided that the company was not large enough to prosper and looked for a partner. This resulted in a take over by Associated Equipment Company (AEC) in 1948. AEC's parent company changed its name to Associated Commercial Vehicles and Crossley became a division of it. Production of the Crossley range of vehicles continued at the Stockport plant until 1952. After that date, production turned to badge engineered AEC designs and bus bodywork, until the factory was closed in 1958 and sold in 1959.

Production of the first cars was on a small scale but from 1909 when a new range was introduced it rapidly built up. In that year the 20 hp was introduced (later called the 20/25) and this was taken up by the War Office and from 1913 it was ordered for the new Royal Flying Corps (RFC). The outbreak of World War I resulted in a rapid expansion of the RFC, and by 1918 they had over 6,000 of the vehicles with staff car, tender (light truck), and ambulance bodies. Crossley 25/30 hp Tenders were used by British paramilitary police ("Black and Tans" and the Auxiliary Division) in Ireland during the Irish War of Independence (19191922). The National Army of the new Irish Free State continued to use them for troop transport throughout the Civil War period, but they were worked hard: of 454 originally supplied, only 57 were in service by 1926 with a further 66 being overhauled or repaired. The 20/25 model was also the first vehicle to be supplied to London's Metropolitan Police Flying Squad in 1920, some of which were fitted with radio equipment. A range of heavy goods vehicles starting with the 1931 diesel powered 12 ton payload Atlas was announced but only a few were made as the factory was by then gearing up to concentrate on buses and military orders. From 1936 military production was rapidly ramped up with British re armament at first with "IGL" models but from 1940 with a four wheel drive "FWD" chassis in both tractor unit and truck form. By 1945 over 10,000 FWDs had been made. After World War II there was a boom in the bus industry as wartime losses needed to be replaced. A new range of bus chassis was launched, comprising the DD42 and SD42 models, suitable for double and single deck bodywork respectively. Crossley won what was then the largest ever British export order for buses with a contract with the Dutch government (150 complete SD42 buses plus 775 supplied as chassis only). By the late 1940s bus orders were decreasing and it became clear that the company was too small to continue as an independent manufacturer and in 1948 they were sold to AEC. The last Crossley chassis was made in 1952, but body production continued at Erwood Park until 1958.