page_title: Swift Motor Company
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Swift Motor Company / History
caption_attribution_description: English: Photo taken by me of the former cycle works in Cheylesmore, Coventry, England. It is now a hotel.
context_page_description: The Swift Motor Company made Swift Cars in Coventry, England from 1900 until 1931. It grew progressively from James Starley's Coventry Sewing Machine Company, via bicycle and motorised cycle manufacture. The cars ranged from a single-cylinder car in 1900 using an MMC engine, through a Swift-engined twin-cylinder 7-horsepower light car in 1904, and a 3-litre model in 1913. After the First World War a successful range was sold during the 1920s, but the Cadet of 1930 was its last vehicle as it could not compete economically with volume manufacturers such as Ford and Morris Motors.
context_section_description: The Coventry Sewing Machine Company was founded by James Starley in 1859. It started making bicycles in 1869 and changed the name to Coventry Machinists Company. In 1896 it became the Swift Cycle Company and started to make motorcycles in 1898, and experimenting with an early car in 1900. In 1902 a separate company was formed for motor vehicle production and registered as the Swift Motor Company.
  After World War 1 ended, the Cycle Car company was merged with the main company as Swift of Coventry and the range was simplified.
  In 1919, A Harper Bean & Sons, who also made Bean Cars, bought 50% of Swift's ordinary shares, but got into severe financial difficulties later that year, seriously affecting the company's finances.
  The last Swift car was the 1930 Cadet. Swift was too small to compete with the likes of Ford and Morris, and closed in 1931 after its suppliers foreclosed on its debts. Coventry Climax was left with a number of engines from the Cadet model, which it used as the basis of its Second World War fire pump engine designated FSM, the SM standing for Swift Motors.
  Production was originally in the Cheylesmore Works but in 1906 car assembly moved to a new factory, Quinton Works in Mile Lane. Some of the cars were equipped with engines manufactured in Saint-Denis Paris by Aster in single, twin or four cylinder configurations.
caption: The former Quinton Works, Cheylesmore, Coventry
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