The story of low cost motorcar
that has provided transport and transformed the lives for millions throughout
the world.
At this time in the British Isles, 1999,
with traffic congestion and speed restrictions continuing to increase,
limiting traffic speeds to well within the capabilities of the one litre
small car. Even so the small car is very much out of fashion despite their
ease of handling, parking and low running costs. This was not always the
case, as many if not most of the cars that are remembered with affection
were small engine-d cars. For example, most of the five million Mini’s
had one litre engines and started with a 850cc engine, also the million
Morris Minor’s had engines of less than1000cc.There are many more examples
like this. The motorcar has revolutionised transport for a significant
part of the world’s population and for the majority of Europeans and Japanese,
this has been due to the availability of reliable, low cost small cars.
This is now happening in many parts of Asia, as the growth of small car
production in the far east shows. If you wish to purchase a car in Britain
today 1999, with an engine capacity of 1100cc or less, to take advantage
of the low road tax rate for cars in this size, with a couple of rare exceptions
and only one built in Britain, it will have come from the far east. This
was not always the case, as the following chapters will show.
Almost from the beginning of motoring history
engineers have striven to produce a durable economic to run motor
car. As engines became lighter and more efficient, relatively simple versions
of the current thinking on car design have been produced. First the mostly
single cylinder “Voiturettes”, made from about 1898 until 1910. Using many
different layouts and drive systems, from the sophisticated to the simple,
manufacturers in Europe and the USA strove to evolve a practical vehicle
for everyday use. From this variety the layout and drive system used by
Louis Renault gained acceptance as the most practical and became the basis
of most car designs for the nextforty years. A front mounted engine with
the gearbox in unit, a propeller shaft and a live rear axle.Austin Voiturette
1909
Around 1910 the
“Cyclecar”, came on to scene, this was the next attempt to produce an even
less expensive form of motor car. The cyclecars produced during the next
thirty years, were in general a mixture of engineering methods, basically
a car chassis fitted with motorcycle derived components and as the Voiturettes
before them, using various layouts and means of transmitting the engine
power to the wheels. The term cyclecar was devised by the European motoring
organisations to define all cars under 1100cc.
By 1912 there were cyclecars on the road
with the same layout as the more conventional cars of the day but with
twin cylinder engines and usually two-seater bodies, these were more durable
than the average run of cyclecars and were usually more expensive.G.N.
cyclecar:
1911
Also introduced at that time were the first
of the very small cars (under 1100cc) that mimicked the form of the
larger cars of the time, down to the four cylinder engine, then as now
the most common. These and the superior cyclecars mentioned above, were
the beginning of the line of cars that provided reliable transport at a
minimum cost to millions of people since that time.A typical example
of it’s type the1914 Jennings, this was fitted with a 1098cc Dorman twin
cylinder engine.
History shows that there is a minimum practical
size of car and a minimum level of engineering refinement and the cyclecar
and microcar were generally below that. The majority of cyclecars, those
with belts and chain drives and other forms of eccentric engineering, had
faded away by 1920, as did the microcar of the 1950’s go by the end of
the decade. Therefore the cars in this study, I believe have provided basic
motoring to the world since about 1912 and will continue for the foreseeable
future.
Since 1906 William and Benjamin
Jowett of Bradford Yorkshire, has been developing a refined cyclecar and
by 1910 it was ready for production. It was worth the wait as it remained
in production as a car, until 1939 and as a van until 1953, undergoing
continuous development. I remember seeing van’s, named the “Bradford”,
on the road in the 1950’s. The car, had a flat twin water
cooled 826cc engine with excellent low speed torque, unit construction
a 3-speed gearbox shaft drive to a worm-geared back axle with a differential,
weighing only 6 1/2 cwt, first with tiller steering , wheel steering and
a bevel rear axle came in 1914.1906 Jowett
This was not an isolated development, for
from 1912 to 1914 there was wide range of new ultra light cars available,
much later to be called “minicars” and “Supermini’s”. As well as the Jowett
just mentioned, was the Swift 7,The Humberette and the Douglas in 1912.
In 1913 Peugeot, Morris and AC had introduced small cars. By 1914 and coming
of war, there were also new cars from Charron, Bayard and Rontiex &
Cummiker in France, also Enfield , Alldays & Onions, Horstmann, Perry
and Standard in Britain, and Adler in Germany. These are the first true
minicars, not the Austin Seven of 1922, that was the car that revolutionised
the public perception of the type. Usually fitted with a two or three seat
coach built tourer body, a windscreen, acetylene lighting and a folding
cape-cart hood,a maximum speed of around 40mph.Allday & Onion
and capable of averaging 25mph and 40 to
50 mpg, priced between £100 and £150, These cars were both
practical and popular in their time. The Swift 7, made in Coventry
was one example,it had a vertical twin water cooled, side valve, splash
lubricated engine of 972cc fitted with a Eisemann magneto and a Claudel
carburettor, a leather cone clutch, a three speed and reverse gate change
gear box located in the centre of the chassis and a bevel rear axle. With
rack and pinion steering, a tubular chassis with a separate subframe for
the engine and gearbox. The improved 1914 chassis was of channel steel
with worm and sector steering, semi-elliptic springs all round, wire wheels
with beaded-edge tyres, a transmission brake operated by a pedal and external
contracting brakes on the back wheels using a lever. The petrol tank was
mounted behind the dash-board, feeding the carburettor by gravity.Swift
The Humberette made by the Humber company
also of Coventry, was similar to the Swift in general but with a “V” twin
air cooled engine the gearbox was in unit with the engine,some of the detail
differences were drip feed lubrication for the engine using a sight glass,
a transverse semi-elliptic leaf spring for the front axle and spring loaded
torque rods locating the rear axle. Hand controlling levers mounted on
the steering column were used for the throttle and ignition settings.The
Humberette of 1914 was fitted with a water cooled version of the
“V” twin engine along with other detail improvements.Production ceased
in 1915, not to be revived after the war.Humberette
Another of the cars listed earlier was the
Alldays“Midget” again similar to the Swift and Humberette, this time with
a 1069cc water cooled vertical twin engine, but with a larger body. The
Perry, also had a water cooled vertical twin engine of 879cc, It was fitted
with Sankey detachable pressed steel wheels with beaded edge tyres. Another
example of the cars fitted with a vertical twin engine was the Enfield
Autolette, this time of 1069cc. The vertical twin engine would not see
such general use again until it’s use in the German minicars of the 1950’s
and the Fiat Nuova 500. The Morris Oxford, made from 1913 until 1917,
had a 1013cc, White & Poppe water cooled “T” head four,giving
it a maximum speed of 50mph, priced at £173 for a 2-seat
weighting 12 1/2 cwt. It was William Morris’s first car. Made at the rate
of forty a week it was of conventional layout, differing from those mentioned
before only in having a four cylinder engine and a greater weight.Morris
Oxford
The Douglas Company used the engine layout
they had become famous for, the horizontally opposed twin, of 1070cc, but
not air cooled as used in their motorcycles, but water cooled. This type
of engine, usually air cooled was to become very popular with ultra light
car makers in the future, being made in the millions. The Douglas
car was again of the conventional layout of front engine and rear
wheel drive, costing £175, it was fitted with C.A.V. electric lighting
and Riley detachable wheels. The A.C. light car of 1913 was fitted with
a water cooled four cylinder engine of 1094cc, supplied by Fivet, it weighed
10cwt, it differed from others of the type in having a three speed gearbox
integral with the rear axle, a disc transmission brake.Douglas
designed by J.Weller it had a top speed of
45mph. From the descriptions given above an idea of the level of
development of the ultra light car can be seen. Other details not mentioned,
was starting the engine, this was carried out using a starting handle usually
permanently mounted on the front of the engine as shown in the picture
on the left. One car not started this way was the Horstmann; it used
a foot starter mechanism, consisting of a large Quick thread formed on
the shaft connecting the clutch to the gearbox and a nut actuated by a
pedal, this could be used from the drivers seat. The Peugeot “Bebe” of
1913,
Made in France and designed by Ettore Bugatti, Fitted with a 856cc
water cooled inline four engine, producing 10bhp at 2,000rpm, it had
HT magneto ignition, a 2 -speed gearbox, weighing 6 3/4 cwt and a maximum
speed of 35 mph.AC
A Bugatti design feature were the reversed
quarter elliptic rear springs. The cylinder block, head and crankcase
was cast in one piece, and the engine had two camshafts one each side of
the engine due to the “T” cylinder head configuration. Another unusual
feature was the transmission that consisted of two concentric propeller
shafts each driving a bevel gear in the back axle and used to provide to
two gear ratios. Costing £160, reducing to £125 in 1915, the
“Babe” was made until 1916, by which time 3,095 examples had been roduced.
Peugeot
“Babe”: about 1915.
By
the beginning of the first world war the ultra light car was an established
part of every day motoring, steadily improving in design and durability,
but by 1916, due to governments orders to direct all industrial resources
to the war effort, all production of small cars stopped and that is how
it remained for the next three years. When production restarted again after
the war, the design of the ultra light car would move on again with unimagined
levels of production to meet an expanding market.
Link
to the rest of Motoring For the Masses
Extracts
from the Sixth Edition of the Autocar Handbook.
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