The First Mass-Produced Car With A V8 Engine Was Obviously American

Plenty of automakers have completely dropped the V8 in recent years, or they’ve begun phasing them out for turbo-fours, hybrids, V6s, and pretty much anything else you can come up with besides an eight-cylinder. So we’re looking back on a time, around the dawn of the last century, when V8s were not, apparently, regarded by the automotive industry as a piece of dated technology, but as the next big thing.

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Cadillac

Founded

1902

Founder

Henry Leland

Headquarters

Warren, Michigan

Owned By

General Motors

Current CEO

Johan de Nysschen

If we gave you three guesses as to which automaker really pioneered the mass-produced V8, we’re betting one of the names you list would be Cadillac, a brand that’s long been associated with the kind of big, extravagant sedans that would demand such a powerplant. You might not know that Rolls-Royce technically beat them to the punch, but failed to bring their own V8 to the mass market before Cadillac. Here’s what you need to know about the dawn of the V8 era.

The Race To Eight Cylinders

In 2025, you’ve got Dodge building an electric car to phase the V8 out. In 1905, you had Rolls-Royce building a V8 to compete with the electric cars that populated urban centers a century ago. The aim was to beat the smooth, silent-running electric car at its own game with an engine that would run like silk. This would become an eight-cylinder combustion-powered motor with an emphasis on smooth performance over raw power output. These engines would be placed in the Rolls-Royce V-8.

Rolls-Royce only made three of these cars, and there are no surviving models today, so we don’t have access to information like power output, or how long it took to get up to its maximum speed, limited to 20 mph, in accordance with the national speed limit at the time.

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We do know that the engine was designed by Henry Royce as a 90-degree side-valve powerplant, lubricated by a pressure system rather than the more common drip lubrication method. Drip lubrication meant fumes, which would have interfered with the automaker’s plan to outsell electric cars. The car never made it to mass production, but it wasn’t exactly a prototype. Rolls-Royce actually sold one unit, and kept the other two for internal use, meaning factory tours and so on.

Cadillac Changed The Game With The First Mass-Produced V8

Nearly a full decade would pass between Rolls-Royce’s early experiments with the V8 and Cadillac’s Type 51, which was introduced in 1914 as the standard engine for 1915 Cadillacs. The Type 51 was a water-cooled ninety-degree side valve configuration, designed by D’Orsay McCall White, the company’s Scottish-born chief engineer, who would eventually become vice-president of Cadillac.

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The Type 51 L-Head engine was introduced to the market in a car of the same name, the very first mass-produced V8-powered passenger vehicle, promised to “speed along under the almost magic influence of this new power-principle.” You know, more than a hundred years later, we still use language like that to describe cars like the Cadillac CT5-V Blackwing. The more things change, the more they stay the same.

In the Type 51, the L-Head was paired to a three-speed manual, with the most expensive model, the Berline Limousine, going for $3,600, or around $114,000 in 2025 dollars. The Type 51 proved to be a success, having sold around 13,000 units in its first year, and setting Cadillac on the path to being one of the most iconic developers of eight-cylinder cars.

The Electric Starter Made A World Of Difference

Rolls-Royce couldn’t really push ahead with their V-8 because the technology simply wasn’t there yet. We’re only talking about a stretch of around ten years, but bear in mind that electric starters weren’t really an option in 1905. The 1912 Cadillac Model 30 is credited as the first car with a real electric starter system. Before that, you had to get out the hand crank and start your car on pure elbow grease.

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That was inconvenient enough with four or six cylinders, but hand-cranking a V8? You might as well cancel your gym membership because you’re getting all the workout you need on the drive there. So, the Type 51 was a clear example of an idea whose time had come. Only the beefiest circus strongmen were ready for a hand-cranked V8 in 1905. By 1915, you could let the battery do the work for you and simply enjoy the ride.

A 110-Year V8 Legacy

If Cadillac ever decides to discontinue their V8s, it’s going to be a miserable day for car culture. Even if you’ve never owned or even driven a Cadillac, we take some comfort in knowing that they’ve been keeping the V8 torch burning for more than a century. In the mid-1970s, just a few short years after the 1972 Oil Crisis, when Americans were building some of the worst engines in automotive history, Cadillac was still building big boy cars like the Eldorado Brougham. A full-size sedan running on gas-gulping eight-cylinders, emphasizing the whole “built for comfort, not for speed” angle of the luxury segment.

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Today, the brand holds true to the V8 vision, producing the CT5-V Blackwing, which stands as the most powerful American-made manual sedan (manual transmissions being an endangered species on their own). Cadillac is no stranger to V6 engines and turbo-fours, but it’s the V8s on which the brand has always staked its reputation.

When you pack a V8 into a muscle car, the idea is that you’re going to want to put all of that power to use. We’re trying to push engine tech to its absolute limits to bring our 0-60s down and our top speeds up. With a Cadillac, it’s more about having that extra power on tap. You’ll probably never take an Escalade-V to the quarter mile, you just like knowing you could if you wanted to.

Some would argue that having a refined, powerful engine under the hood, and not giving a damn what you’re spending at the pump, is just part of the “status symbol” aspect of driving a luxury car. Maybe. But the overall experience is what really sells the car to most drivers, and that means having more power than you need, just in case you wind up needing it. It’s about confident driving. It’s about knowing that, if the slowpoke you’re passing suddenly starts speeding up for some reason, you won’t have a problem getting out in front of them. Naturally, that means having a couple more cylinders at your disposal than the next driver.

Sources: Cadillac, GM Heritage, Rolls-Royce.