History We ALL Love a DARE! PIX of TRULY Extinct Makes?

Yeah! She was a well-known American socialite whose signature was those flamboyant scarves. Vanessa Redgrade played her in an early '70s movie, "The Lives of Isadora," if I recall the title correctly.

 

Has anyone heard of the Brogan micro-car, made in Rossmoyne, Ohio (near Cincinnati), from 1946 to 1948 (maybe a little later)? Beyond the company behind it, B & B Specialty Co., I have not been able to find anything else. Even the big post-WWII, Bruce Weiner Microcar Museum in Georgia doesn't have one.

 

1946 Brogan: Three wheels was the way forward for economy cars in the immediate post-war period; US company Brogan built a series of three-wheelers with two-cylinder engines.

 

And while I'm at it............

1948 Aerocar: Molt Taylor from Washington reckoned cars would be more useful if they could fly, so he built this. Capable of 56mph on land and 125mph in the air, just five were made.

1948 Bond Minicab: For masochists only, the Minicab offered economy motoring at its most basic; early editions featured a two-stroke single-cylinder engine driving the front wheel by chain.


1953 Biscuit: One of the most popular microcars of the Fifties, the Biscuit was a Spanish runabout created by Gabriel Voisin, more usually noted for his incredibly luxurious cars.




1953 Fairthorpe Atom: Taking crudity to new levels, the Atom and open-topped Atomota were amazingly basic. Optional extras included bumpers, hub caps, door handles and electric starting.

1954 Rodley 750: Astonishingly, around 65 suckers were persuaded to part with their cash in return for one of these, despite a breathtaking lack of sophistication and those boxy lines.

1954 SNCAN Inter: You can tell from the picture that this was the product of an aircraft company, but it certainly wasn't for millionaires only with its 7bhp 175cc single-cylinder engine.

1956 Brutsch Mopetta: Powered by a 49cc single-cylinder engine, the Mopetta was brainchild of German racing driver Egon Brutsch. It was just 5' 7" long and resembled a fairground dodgem.

1956 Vespa 400: Better known for its scooters, Italian company Vespa built this eco car in France to avoid upsetting the mighty Fiat. Initially successful, sales quickly tailed off to nothing.

 

1969 Adams Probe 16: The world got its first glimpse of this futuristic design at the 1969 London motor show; of the three constructed, two survive. Power came from a BL 1800cc engine.

1969 Willam Farmer: An umbrella group of French microcar builders, Willam offered all sorts of weird creations for those on a budget, powered by 125cc Lambretta scooter engines.

1970 Bond Bug: Has any three-wheeler ever been cooler than the Bug? A whopping 2268 were sold by parent company Reliant, which had acquired Bond two years earlier.

1973 Minissima Firenza HP Droop: A William Towns creation, the Minissima was meant to replace the Mini, but it was too radical for BL to build. But it did see production as the Elswick Envoy disabled car.

 

2006 Venturi Eclectic: You wouldn't buy it for its looks, but the Eclectic is certainly clever as it can harness wind and solar power for truly green motoring - or you can recharge it from a socket.

 

Sorry, I hit the motherload.............

1973 Mini Outspan Orange: Retaining few of the Mini's marvellous handling characteristics, Outspan Minis were a regular fixture at events nationwide in the 1970s - and several have survived.


1919 Leyat: Not sure this would score too well in the EuroNCAP safety ratings; it's an aircraft-inspired car that was incredibly noisy and unrefined - and lethal to any pedestrians it hit.

1934 Crossly Burney: Designed by Sir Dennistoun Burney, this rear-engined leviathan was supposed to be the ultimate in luxury at £750. Around 20 were made and at least one survives.


​

 

2008 Rinspeed Squba: The world has been waiting for a cross between a submarine and open-topped car - and here it is, based on the Elise. Unlikely to be a big seller, the Squba is slightly mad...

2008 Tramontana: Spain can't boast many indigenous car makers now Seat is part of VW, but here's a home-grown company that offers V12 performance at a mere €500,000 a throw.

2009 Bollore BlueCar: Designed with help from Renault's engineers, the Bollore electric prototype was made by battery maker Batscap. It's hoped to put the car into production next year.

 

1977 Panther Six: Looking like something created by Gerry Anderson, the Six featured an 8.2-litre twin-turbo V8 in the rear, which could supposedly provide a 200mph top speed.



1981 Tickford Metro: Proving the premium city car is nothing new, the Tickford Metro took Austin's finest and added a touch of British craftsmanship with leather and wood galore.


1985 Glenfrome Facet: Also known as the Profile, this weird Range Rover-based confection must rank as one of the ugliest cars ever created - which is why its maker went belly up very quickly.

 

Here is another unusual "car," a 1913 Motorette, built by the Kelsey Car Corp. of auto pioneer C.W. Kelsey in Hartford, CT, prior to WWI. Not exactly a cyclecar and not really an automobile, motorettes were first built in France before 1900. Kelsey actually build cars in three different decades and in different locations.



1913 Kelsey Motorette, thanks to EarlyAmericanAuto-
mobiles.com, the site maintained by enthusiast Royal
Feltner of Amesbury, MA

 

SWI, man, I'm glad you found this pic of a '46 Brogan.
My searches were going almost nowhere for this Ohio-
built car. One source seemed to indicate it used at least
some Crosley components, but I could find no verification.

 

Hmmmmmmmm!?!?!? Maybe Father Juliano was just 10 years ahead of the game!

 

I see we have strayed foreign in a couple of places so I thought you might like this one. This is the last series of which I think they made 4 so it's pretty rare. 5 liter straight 8 with a 2 speed behind a 3 speed transmission.

 

2003 Gibbs Aquada: Priced at £150,000, buyers would never be easy to find for this amphibious car which was really rather good on land and in the water; probably best of the breed in fact.


1994 Renault Espace F1: Just what the world needs; a people carrier with a 3.5-litre V10 engine from the Williams FW14 Formula 1 car. So equipped, the Espace could reputedly top 190mph.

 

Actually the Brogan was mentioned in this topic once before on page 112

and this link was added.
http://books.google.com/books?id=Li...Co,+Rossmoyne,+Ohio&cd=3#v=onepage&q=&f=false

 

1954 Chevrolet Corvair Don't think SWI has posted this one yet.



The 1954 Corvair’s fastback styling with chopped off tail was influenced by European designs. In Europe, designers were more conceirned about aerodynamics than American designers were. Note the hood vents and front fender “gills”, wich were both scrapped on the production Corvette. Like its siblings, the Corvair used the same front design, though it also sported ribbed air intakes on the hood that routed fresh air to the interior and fender vents that allowed heat to escape the engine compartment. In typical Corvette fashion, the Corvair also had a wraparound windshield, with nearly vertical A-pillars like the Nomad, but without the wing windows. The roof was aircraft-inspired, sweeping back and tapering gracefully, eventually ending at the chrome-trimmed license plate housing, which resembled a jet-fighter exhaust port.





The roof was also interesting in a couple of other ways. First, it gave a glimpse of the quarter window and C-pillar treatment of the 1958 Chevrolet line, much like the Biscayne did a year later. Secondly, the addition of a fastback roof did not alter the Corvair’s interior layout. One would have expected that it would have had a finished-off cargo area, perhaps even equipped with fitted luggage, as was a common practice with sports cars at the time. Instead, the body appeared to have the roof grafted right on to a production Corvette, as there is no storage area behind the seats. The stock trunk area is used with a decklid contoured to the new roofline. The seats had the production fiberglass divider between them, just like a stock Corvette roadster. The area is even body-colored, which actually makes for a very attractive, albeit unusual interior layout for a closed coupe. The remainder of the interior is largely stock, with custom white seat covers and chromed interior C-pillar trim pieces.





Unfortunately for this particular machine, it was the only one of the three that did not reach production in some form. With Corvette sales becoming sluggish during the 1954 model year, it was seen by product planners as too high a gamble. The time for a Corvette fastback eventually did come, though nearly a decade later and on a new-generation machine.

 

[SIZE=+2]1956 Eschelmann Adult Sport Car[/SIZE] Baltimore, MD, USA
Briggs & Stratton 4-stroke 248cc
no suspension ,no charging system for the battery
brakes consisted of pads rubbing on the tires
starter: rope pull
this is a “deluxe” model because it has thin padded seats
and rockets from JC Whitney on the sides.



[SIZE=+2]1980 HMV Freeway[/SIZE] Minneapolis, MN, USA



<CENTER>1955 Thrif-T

</CENTER><CENTER>Tri-Wheel Motor Corp, Springfield, Mass.



</CENTER>

 

Sorry about that Brogan biz. When I ran a search this morning, all I got was my first question. So, after searching I just posted what I'd found & asked for more info. Not being a computer wiz -- and with the computer probs I've had for a considerable time now, i guess I'm doomed to f--- up occasionally.

 

Another one of those kooky one-offs, the Surlesmobile, cast in the experimental teardrop shape that cropped up in the late '20s and went 'til nearly 1950. This prototype is dated as 1945 and was built under the supervision of a Virginia Yankee, English-only-speaking Donald Surles who supervised a crew of craftsmen who spoke only Japanese. They constructed the car at the Tokyo Bus Works upon a Willys Jeep platform.

Apparently, Surles found the project trying enough that he didn't pursue copies, so the only one is in the Roaring Twenties Museum in Virginia. The car did include some innovative features, including windows that rolled upward out of the way, then back DOWN into place in the body, as well as a pop-out safety windshield (a la Tucker). Other windows would pop out, as well. Reportedly, the language barrier caused the construction to consume five months, and Surles resultantly left off several planned innovations, too. The B/W photo here was taken in '67 and was featured in the Valley Banner, Elkton, VA.

 

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Helicron

In the late 1930s this one-of-a-kind Helicron was

placed in a barn and forgotten. More than six

decades later this odd lost little gem was

rediscovered, rebuilt, and reintroduced to the

world... Although the manufacturer is unknown,

it's believed that this car was built in

France 1932. Following the first World War it was not

uncommon for recently displaced airplane

engineers to look towards the automobile

industry for employment.

As in this example, a few entrepreneurs developed

propeller-powered cars with the notion that

propeller power was an efficient means of moving

a vehicle. On this car, when the wooden

propeller is spinning at full speed and

efficiently, this little 1,000-pound boat-tailed

skiff can hit freeway speeds exceeding 75 mph.

This is the one and only Helicron in existence,

owned by Lane Motor Museum in Nashville,


TN.

</td></tr></tbody></table>

 

I have been away for a while but found out someone was talking about me so decided to upload some pics of the progress on my 1925 Indiana truck so you all wouldn't think it was another extinct truck!

 

The Dodo cyclecar of 1912 was just one of about 40 such makes built in the U.S. from around 1910 to 1920. But the name is really the attention-getter! Nowadays, automakers knock themselves out shooting for model names that evoke an air of power, reliability, freedom, prestige, and so on.

Though the Dodo was a century ago, one still has to wonder: What were these people thinking? Even then, the most common definition of "dodo" described a slow, flightless -- extinct -- bird, generally perceived to have been so ill-adapted as to be almost guaranteed of extinction. In fact, the Dodo bird took its name directly from a word applied by Portuguese sailors, translated as silly or stupid. Oh, well.

Nevertheless, the Dodo was one of the first cyclecars in the U.S., following upon early cyclecar popularity in Europe. Big enough to carry two people with its 9-horse engine, the Dodo lived up to its namesake, dying out after being built one year.

Illustration in the public domain

So what's in a name? The Lulu of 1914-1915 is another that would raise eyebrows today, but a century ago, "lulu" was popular slang for a knockout dame or just about anything else extraordinary. The Lulu was made in Beavertown, Pa., by the already established Kearns Motor Truck Co. By all reports, the Lulu was deserving of its name, being solidly constructed and possessed of a reliable transmission, shaft drive and 12-14-horse four-cylinder engine -- the results of some lengthy experimentation and development by Kearns. But WWI impacted Lulu production, and it was dropped so that Kearns could concentrate on truck building.

So unlike most other cyclecars, the peppy Lulu was, perhaps, also very deserving of its name, though for different reasons than the ill-fated Dodo! While I could find no Lulu pic or drawing, below is another cyclecar, a 1914 Twombly. Made from 1913-1915, the Twombly, like the Lulu, featured a four-cylinder engine, whereas the vast majority of cyclecars used only one or two cylinders. It was made in Nutley, NJ, and sold for less than $700.



Thanks to Wikipedia (GNU Free Documentation License)

Several 'net sources name some 40 U.S. makes of cyclecars. Most went defunct by the early '20s, but cyclecars became fashionable again in the years after WWII, this time known as microcars or "bubblecars." Some of the early cyclecars on the list below have been mentioned previously n this thread (though only a handful have been covered in detail). As always, PHOTOS would be welcome on any of these makes. [Note: Searching "cyclecar" will pull up a post by thread regular SWI showing a panoramic photo of a 1914 cyclecar race!]

U.S. Cyclecars

American
Asheville
Comet
Cycle-Car
Cyclops
Dayton
Delco
Dodo
Dudly Bug
EIM
Falcon
Fenton
Geneva
Greyhound
Hanover
Hawkins
Hoosier Scout
IMP
(Kearns) LuLu
Keller
La Vigne
Limit
Malcolm Jones
Merz
Michaelson
Mecca
Mercury
O-We-Go
Pioneer
Post
Prigg
Pacific
Real
Scripps-Booth
Twombly
Vixen
Winthur
Wizzard
Woods Mobilette
Xenia

 

While I have not found a picture of the Lulu (YET), I have proof that one still exists!!!!!!
http://news.google.com/newspapers?n...n4lAAAAIBAJ&sjid=qfIFAAAAIBAJ&pg=1325,2657422

 

Nice goin', SWI!

 

Motoring Memories: Cyclecars

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[FONT=ms sans serif, geneva, helvetica, arial][SIZE=-2]1914 Scripps-Booth Cycle Car. Photo: Bill Vance[/SIZE][/FONT]​

</td> </tr> </tbody></table> [FONT=arial, helvetica] by Bill Vance
[/FONT]
[FONT=arial, helvetica]For the first half of this century, North America didn&#8217;t have much interest in small cars. Compared with Europe, our modest license fees and cheap fuel provided little incentive to drive smaller cars. Names that quickly came and went, like American
[/FONT]
[FONT=arial, helvetica]Austin/Bantam, Crosley, and Henry J, attest to the fact that, as the conventional Detroit wisdom went, &#8220;nobody wants a peanut car.&#8221;
[/FONT]
[FONT=arial, helvetica] The 1950 Nash Rambler was an exception, but it took the imports, and a couple of oil crises, to really raise interest in more economical cars.
[/FONT]
[FONT=arial, helvetica] There had, however, been a brief small-car blip in our auto history. It was known as the cyclecar era, and it started in about 1913, just before the First World War. Cyclecars were a kind of cross between motorcycles and regular cars, and they probably did much to sour the marketplace on really small cars for a long time.
[/FONT]
[FONT=arial, helvetica] These tiny machines were so narrow that the two passengers were almost always seated in tandem, not side-by-side. Wheelbases were typically under 2,540 mm (100 in.). A 914 mm (36 in.) track was common, allowing them to ride up out of the ruts made by the 1,422 mm (56 in.) track of regular cars.
[/FONT]
[FONT=arial, helvetica] Weight was usually in the 272 to 363 kg (600 to 800 lb) range, with power often provided by a two-cylinder air-cooled engine. The Spacke Machine & Tool Company of Indianapolis, Indiana, was a popular engine supplier.
[/FONT]
[FONT=arial, helvetica] They usually rode on spindly, motorcycle-type, wire-spoke wheels, although wooden spokes were used occasionally. The engine was often mounted under the hood. Power transmission systems varied, one of the most popular being a long leather belt on each side of the car delivering power to the rear wheels. Frames were typically made of wood. [/FONT]
[FONT=arial, helvetica] The whimsical nature of these cyclecars was exemplified by their names: Dudly Bug, Imp, O-We-Go, Zip, Cricket and Greyhound.
[/FONT]
[FONT=arial, helvetica] The genesis of the cyclecar seems to have been the 1910 French Bedelia made by the Bourbeau et Devaux Co. of Paris. The Bedelia was low and light, and carried its two passengers in tandem, with the rear passenger doing the steering. Power came from single-cylinder or V-twin engines.
[/FONT]
[FONT=arial, helvetica] The cyclecar craze exploded in Europe, going from a handful of manufacturers to hundreds in months. Their smallness, lightness, and relative crudeness required limited capital and moderate skill to enter the business.
[/FONT]
[FONT=arial, helvetica] When cyclecars found their way to this side of the Atlantic about three years later, manufacturers popped up from Connecticut to Washington State; Detroit was home to about a dozen. Canada participated too. In about 1914 the Dart Cycle Car Co. was established in Toronto to build a Canadian version of the American Scripps-Booth cyclecar. Only a few were produced.
[/FONT]
[FONT=arial, helvetica] In 1921, the Glen Motor Co. in Scarborough Beach near Toronto manufactured cyclecars. They were fitted with three-cylinder air-cooled engines, but few were actually assembled because the fad had passed.
[/FONT]
[FONT=arial, helvetica] Cyclecars were a short-lived chapter in automotive history, their popularity being pretty well finished by about 1915. There were several reasons for their demise. The relatively easy entry into the business resulted in many primitive, under-designed machines. Their inherent flimsiness, and the extremely poor roads of the day, soon reduced most to little more than a pile of parts. Engine failure was common, and the lack of a generator or magneto limited the travelling range of many.
[/FONT]
[FONT=arial, helvetica] Some manufacturers, like Scripps-Booth, did produce well engineered vehicles, and moved on to conventional cars. But most simply disappeared during the First World War.
[/FONT]
[FONT=arial, helvetica] Henry Ford also hastened their demise. Noting the number of cyclecar manufacturers springing up in Detroit, and alarmed that they might give the automobile a bad name, he quietly had a three- quarter scale Model T built. It had a wooden frame, a smaller version of the Model T engine, and wire-spoked wheels. Henry displayed it around Detroit, which immediately started the rumour that Ford was going into the cyclecar business. Wily Henry didn&#8217;t announce such an intention, but the chilling affect that the little Ford had on the amount of capital available for cyclecars enterprises contributed significantly to their death in the Motor City.
[/FONT]
[FONT=arial, helvetica] Henry Ford&#8217;s Model T was another factor. His moving assembly line, pioneered in 1913, built cars faster and cheaper than anyone else. Henry continually lowering the price to the point where Model Ts were almost as cheap as cyclecars.
[/FONT]
[FONT=arial, helvetica] Cyclecars were a brief and interesting, but not very successful, chapter in automotive history. Examples can usually be seen in better automotive collections, such as the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Michigan[/FONT]

 

Here's a 1909 Kearns Runabout

 

I ran across this one too.
another Buffalo Built car I don't beleive I had on my list!
1902 Centaur Runabout
Centaur Motor Vehicle Co. Buffalo, NY
1902-1903

 

1903 Kensington Tonneau
Kensington Automobile Co. Buffalo, N.Y.
1899-1904

1903 LaFrance Tonneau
Sidney B. Bowman Automobile Co., New York, NY

 

Baby Cyclecar

A DIMINUTIVE one-man sport car, said to attain a speed of 80 miles an hour and combining the advantages of larger cars, is equipped with a three-speed transmission and a powerful four-cylinder air cooled engine.

The clutch is controlled by a pedal and gear shifting by a short lever. The transmission drives to a jackshaft and thence by side chains to the rear wheels. Brakes operated by lever act on the rear wheel drums.

The entire car weighs 800 pounds and clears the ground by only six inches.
​