1928 Hadfield-Bean 14/45 Tourer
Offered by H&H Classics | Duxford, U.K. | October 19, 2022
Bean Cars first entered the automotive industry as a parts supplier and started producing automobiles in the wake of WWI, which they had tooled up for and now needed a product to push out. So the first Bean cars went on sale in 1919.
They got up to speed quickly, selling a lot of cars for an upstart. But expansion was expensive, especially as the market slowed. Bean was bankrupt by the end of 1920. So in stepped Hadfields Limited, a steel company, among others, saving the company. A few years later debts had mounted again and Hadfields came to the rescue, this time getting a majority share of Bean as a result.
So from 1927, all Bean cars were sold as Hadfield-Bean, and the following year they launched the 14/45 (which I am pretty sure this is). Well, the cars were launched before they were sorted and it tanked the brand value because, well, they weren’t great. Passenger car production ceased in 1929 with commercial vehicles lasting through 1931.
The 14/45 was powered by a 2.3-liter inline-four, and this one has known history back to the 1930s. A restoration was completed in the late 1970s. The pre-sale estimate is $28,000-$32,000. Click here for more info.