Welcome to the HAMB! What is the car in your avitar, and will get to see it at Lime Rock at an event this year?
1923 Delage 2 LCV - V-12. I made it to Lime Rock every year in the 70-80's, but have not been there since the 90's....
I have their numbers... 1906 3A Ferenc Szisz 3B J. Edmond 3C Claude Richez 1907 R1 Ferenc Szisz R2 Henry Farman J. Edmond Alternative Driver R3 Claude Richez and that wire wheeled picture captioned as 1906 qualifying.
Hello All, I'm new here, today's the first day. Yesterday I covered the first 3 pages and the last page of this thread, successfully burning a number of hours. But what a way to burn them. To you T-Head, I think a year or two ago on the Pikes Peak web site I first saw that photo of the Paige pair incorrectly captioned, in the same way as written up by 'ehdubya'. Seems all historical photos have been removed from that site now, in anticipation of some rejig. There were some other photos on that site which were probably also incorrectly captioned, as though some well meaning individual had had a stab at captioning for captioning's sake. Obviously we need to be careful creating captions for photos. History can be inadvertently changed in just a couple of key strokes. I'm looking forward to going back through this great thread, and to sticking with it into the future. Thanks to all contributors to date.
1920 ESSEX "Pike's Peak" Special This photo has appeared in a few Hudson History books. In the John A. Conde book, 'The Cars That Hudson Built' the following photo caption was used - "1920 ESSEX - Earlier, Hudson Motor Car Company developed this impressive looking Essex racer called the Pike's Peak Special, which was entered in racing events in various parts of the country. Note the twin bucket seats." Can anybody shed more light on the history of this particular car? It seems odd that a Pike's Peak special should carry head and tail lights, which this car does. Where else might it have been used other than possibly on show room floors as an attraction for sales attention grabbing? They built a Hudson at the same time with an almost identical body. Cheers Jim
Jim, Welcome to the HAMB! That is a very nice looking Essex, look forward to your future posts. There is a fair amount of 1916-1919 Hudson info a few months back in this thread.
Welcome to the HAMB. There is lot's of Maxwell history scattered throughout this thread, be sure to use the 'search' button at the top of the page if there is anything you are looking for. Welcome Jim. It's always good to have some company here.
Welcome Jim, just you try It took T-Head a couple of minutes to pick that up! Just throw it out there if you're not sure I think you're right about the PP site, I remember one linking the Artemis images. It looked like the caption was meant for a different picture, I couldn't see any greeting of well wishers but those Paiges look Essex-ish. I think this local car is modeled on that one in your picture. The lights don't seem strange if it's not racing, it seems it wasn't unusual to drive some distance to the peak.
I have one of those Juhasz triblex carbs. Serialnumber 19. Very cool patent. I beleive i will use it on the model T gowjob when i get around to it. I like the three stages and the fully adjustability, similar to the Model S Winfield. The two things i look forward to experience are the acceleration caracteristics and the smoothness in the transition between the stages. A very massive and heavy unit, unlike the millers that weighs about one fourth of the juhasz.
Jenatzy's Mercedes and Rigolly's Gobron-Brille at the their start of the 1906 French GP. Two cars were lined up and every 90 seconds one car started the race. Lartique photo.
The Essex 4 special above in the New Zealand creek is modelled on the 1920 ESSEX "Pike's Peak" Special photo and was built up a few years ago into a very interesting modified car by a Mr. Graeme Shaskey. I am appending a photo of the larger sibling car to the Essex 4 based on a Hudson and named the 1920 Hudson "Pike's Peak" Special. Has anybody seen photos of the rear end of these cars?
There are a number of articles on the Maxwell racers you refer to. The Automobile (5/27/1915) states; "The Maxwell motor has overhead valves, of course, but they are not inclined, standing vertical with the stems upward. There are four valves per cylinder and they are operated by rockers from a single central camshaft, the valves being staggered so as to make room for enough cams...Maxwell is alone in using skew or helical gearing for driving the overhead camshaft instead of a spur gear train or bevel gearing" Ray Harroun was responsible for much of the engineering of these racers and with the shaft out front driving the camshaft it may be a tough deal to run two shafts. Peugeot and other engines running two camshafts (either an inline DOHC or a v-shaped SOHC) often opted for spur gears. The picture you posted was taken in 1915. The pictures below are from 1916 wherein they cleaned up the intake manifold and a few other changes. I thought I may have other pictures-if I do I can't find them right now. Pretty cool engines nevertheless-Jim
Hello Jim, Looks like the same engine to me. It does not look like SOHC with rockers, nothing like the 1914 MB, and the valves look inclined, not staggered. Do you see any room for rockers in that photo ? It looks like a shaft driven DOHC, with two front gears, and followers ( tappets) above the valve stems. Very much a 1912 Peugeot copy, in any event Rickenbacker said the biggest mistake of his racing career was trading his Peugeot to Miller and driving for Maxwell. There is very little info on these early engines and much of it is incorrect or tainted with national pride. It is amazing how quickly these guys copied the engines that won and you can see why Enzo Ferrrari used to crush his cars after the season... I am trying to research the origins of the finger type cam follower. Most text credit the 1921 FIAT twin cam, but there is some info that the Frontenac 1914 "iron" engine had them . Any ideas ?
Interesting photo of a special I found, it came without any details but it looks like it has all the right things.
Interesting model T racer with a very usual name. It appears to have an overhead as it exhausts on the left and they were using the funnel at the front as way to try to scavenge the exhaust gases out.
Here is the 1914 Peugeot, after they adopted gears instead of the 1912 shaft cam drive. Notice the cam oil lines at the back of the twin cylindrical cam housings on the Maxwell. SOHC ?
First off thanks for joining us psalt. I would also be interested in what you find if you come up with the overhead cam engine that used them first. I could be wrong but I would venture a guess that the origin of the lever follower originated with an earlier non overhead cam engine. It was then used on an overhead cam to keep the side thrust from affecting the valve and stem. It was used in earlier T-Heads as the Mercer drawing shows and Porter its designer could have copied someone earlier. I think that its real origin probably may go back even earlier to steam engines or some other type of machinery.
Yep, I think that might be Norman 'Wizard' Smith. He did a lot of city-to-city record breaking in an Essex 4 in the early '20s, before moving on to world land speed record attempts in the early 30's. Here's a couple of photos of him after completing the Hobart-Launceston-Hobart, Tasmania record dash. He later wrote, "My next record was from Hobart to Launceston and back to Hobart, a distance of 243 miles on the 9th December 1923 before breakfast. Leaving Hobart at 4 a.m. we returned at 8:19 a.m. a speed average of 56½ miles per hour elapsed time, or more than one mile per minute running time. On this record I was accompanied by Mr. Bert. Heathorn. This gentleman knew the road well, and was of great assistance throughout."
When i started this thread i didn't think there would be pictures of headstones, to be honest it never even crossed my mind. There probably isn't an Autoracing thread on the web as unique as this. It also has me thinking what could be next, pictures and info of the racer's favorite bottle of wine? Leon Thery's headstone. Next photo is the winning Richard Brasier from the 1904 Gordon Bennett Cup. Thery is seated with his mechanic. I'm assuming it could be Muller. Third and fourth photos are the Brasier cars of #8 Thery and mechanic Mignot and #25 Paul Baris and his mechanic Godin at the 1908 GP de l'ACF @ Dieppe. Both cars retired. The French race would also be the last for Thery, nicknamed 'chronometer' and one of France's best drivers, he arrived in his country a hero and was feted by President Emile Loubet at Elysee Palace along with Charles Henri-Brasier after his victory in the '04 Gordon Bennett race, sadly he would die the following year from tuberculosis. He also left a legacy that continues to this day. He was responsible for the naming of the Michelin man, Bibendum.
Is the Michelin Man imbibing in something French w/alcohol and horse shoes in it? I think this is Kurtis's way of bringing wine to the table. Can anyone translate it for us?
Terraplane specials at the 1938 Lobethal GP, South Australia - the unnumbered car is Harry Beith, #10 is Bob Lea Wright.
The Jalopy Journal
