Saturday, December 8, 2012

Board Track Racing~ "This Had to be So Cool Back Then"

Uploaded on Aug 15, 2010

Vintage Racing found at www.motoredbikes.com


Uploaded on Nov 4, 2009
Track racing in Bielefeld, Germany. Many thanks to RC Zugvogel Bielefeld, the owner of the track.
We had a great time!

Board track racing was a type of motorsport popular in the United States during the 1910s and 1920s. Competition was conducted on circular or oval race courses with surfaces composed of wooden planks. This type of track was first used for motorcycle competition, wherein they were called motordromes, before being adapted for use by various different types of racing cars.

The majority of the American national championship races were contested at such venues during the 1920s.
Board tracks proliferated in part because they were inexpensive to construct, but they lacked durability and required a great deal of maintenance to remain usable. Many of the tracks survived for as little as three years before being abandoned.

With the onset of the Great Depression in the early 1930s, board track racing disappeared rapidly. However, several of its most notable aspects have continued to influence American motorsports up to the present day, including: A technical emphasis on raw speed produced by the steep banking; ample track width to allow steady overtaking between competitors; and the development of extensive grandstands or stadium-style spectator seating surrounding many of the courses.


History


Construction of a board track at Uniontown, Pennsylvania in 1916

Motorcycles racing on a board track in 1911

Some early board tracks were circular. This is a view of the Los Angeles Motordrome, the first of its kind.

Barney Oldfield (left) racing a car on a board track in 1915

Qualifying speeds at two-mile Tacoma Speedway were sometimes higher than those at Indianapolis.

Location Track length Years active Location Track length Years active
Playa del Rey, California 1.0 mile (1.6 km) 1910–1913 Cotati, California 1.25 miles (2.01 km) 1921–1922
Elmhurst, California 0.5 miles (0.80 km) 1911–1913 Kansas City, Missouri 1.25 miles (2.01 km) 1922–1924
Chicago, Illinois 2.0 miles (3.2 km) 1915–1917 Altoona, Pennsylvania 1.25 miles (2.01 km) 1923–1931
Des Moines, Iowa 1.0 mile (1.6 km) 1915–1917 Charlotte, North Carolina 1.25 miles (2.01 km) 1924–1926
Omaha, Nebraska 1.25 miles (2.01 km) 1915–1917 Culver City, California 1.25 miles (2.01 km) 1924–1927
Brooklyn, New York 1.0 mile (1.6 km) 1915–1919 Salem, New Hampshire 1.25 miles (2.01 km) 1925–1927
Tacoma, Washington 2.0 miles (3.2 km) 1915–1922 Laurel, Maryland 1.125 miles (1.811 km) 1925–1926
Uniontown, Pennsylvania 1.125 miles (1.811 km) 1916–1922 Miami, Florida 1.25 miles (2.01 km) 1926–1927
Cincinnati, Ohio 2.0 miles (3.2 km) 1916–1919 Atlantic City, New Jersey 1.5 miles (2.4 km) 1926–1928
Beverly Hills, California 1.25 miles (2.01 km) 1920–1924 Woodbridge, New Jersey 0.5 miles (0.80 km) 1929–1931
Fresno, California 1.0 mile (1.6 km) 1920–1927 Akron, Ohio 0.5 miles (0.80 km) unknown
San Carlos, California 1.25 miles (2.01 km) 1921–1922 Bridgeville, Pennsylvania 0.5 miles (0.80 km) unknown
[7]
The first board track for motor racing was the circular Los Angeles Motordrome in Playa del Rey, California, built in 1910.[1]

Based on the same technology as European velodromes used for bicycle racing, this track and others like it were constructed with 2-inch (51 mm) x 4-inch (100 mm) boards, often with turns banked at up to 45 degrees. In some cases, such as the track at Culver City, banking was 50 degrees or more.[2]

Longer tracks were later built - some up to 2 miles (3.2 km) long by 1915 - and lap speeds exceeding 100 miles per hour became commonplace.[3][4][5]

Interest in motorsport was exploding during this period and by 1929, at least 24 board tracks had been built around the country, although by 1931, 20 of the 24 had been shut-down or abandoned, and from 1932 on there were no more championship-level races run on boards.[6][7]

 The tracks were relatively inexpensive to construct compared to more permanent facilities - the total facility cost of the 2-mile (3.2 km) Tacoma Speedway was just $100,000 in 1915, compared to the $700,000 spent in 1909 just to pave the 2.5-mile (4.0 km) Indianapolis Motor Speedway.[8][9]


Racing on these tracks often drew large crowds of paying spectators. In 1915, a crowd of 80,000 was reported in Chicago, three weeks after only 60,000 had attended the Indianapolis 500.[6]

Relatively small and isolated Tacoma (population 83,000 in 1910) had turned out 35,000 to see a race the year before.[10][11]

 To attract both competitors and fans, race promoters offered what were then considered sensational amounts of prize money - a total purse of $25,000 was not unusual around the time of World War One.[12][13]

After WWI, the Automobile Association of America's Contest Board resumed and re-organized the National Championship system.[14]

From the beginning of the 1920 season to the end of 1931, the AAA sanctioned a total of 123 championship racing events on 24 different race tracks, and 82 of those races were run on wooden surfaces. (Of the remainder, 12 were on the bricks of Indianapolis, and the other 29 were on dirt tracks or road courses.)[15]
 

Safety

The first track in Playa del Rey was banked at a 3:1 pitch (about 20 degrees), but later tracks were built with higher banking and some motorcycle tracks were banked up to 60 degrees.[16][17]

Even though the physics of such track designs were intuitively obvious, it was not until construction of the Beverly Hills track in 1919 that builders began to incorporate engineering knowledge that had been known to railroads for decades.

At Beverly Hills, designer Art Pillsbury, who eventually worked on more than half of the championship-caliber board tracks nationwide, first employed the Searle Spiral Easement Curve, and the effect on car handling was pronounced.[18][19]

According to Pillsbury, a correctly engineered track could be driven without steering - the car would steer itself simply due to the track geometry.[18]

The effects of theses changes were higher cornering speeds and higher G-forces on drivers, but not necessarily greater safety.

Driver fatalities continued to mount on board tracks into the 1920s, and included four Indianapolis 500 winners, three of which occurred at the Altoona track (another Pillsbury design) in Tipton, Pennsylvania, and three in the same years in which the driver won at Indianapolis.

Winner of the 1919 Indianapolis 500, Howdy Wilcox died in an Altoona race on September 4, 1923, while co-1924 winner Joe Boyer and 1929 winner Ray Keech both suffered fatal accidents at the facility in the same years as their Indianapolis 500 wins - Keech's occurring only seventeen days after, on June 15, 1929. Gaston Chevrolet, winner of the 1920 Indianapolis 500, perished that same autumn, on November 25, 1920, in a Thanksgiving Day race at Beverly Hills.[20]

Even when the cars did not crash, racing on a board track was exceedingly dangerous due to flying wood splinters and debris, and due to the primitive tire technology of the era.[21][22]

In one oral history taken from a driver, he told a tale of wooden shards driven into the faces of drivers and riding mechanics, and sudden catastrophic tire failures caused by track conditions.[23] Cars were fitted with anti-splinter devices to protect their radiators.[24]

On the motorcycling motordromes, the situation was also very dangerous and the danger was aggravated by the riders' lack of proper safety equipment.[25]

 Fans sat above the top of the track, looking down at the racers. When a rider lost control, he could slip up off the track and into the crowd. Many fatalities occurred, often involving spectators.

The velodrome at Nutley, New Jersey, a 18 mi (200 m) oval banked at 45 degrees (generating lap times of 8 seconds or less) and built from 1 in × 12 in (25 mm × 300 mm) lumber on edge, was "unquestionably the deadliest".[26]

On September 8, 1912, "Texas Cyclone" Eddie Hasha was killed at a motordrome near Atlantic City in an accident that also killed 4 spectators and injured 10 more.

The deaths made the front page of the New York Times,[27] and the press started calling the short 1/4 and 1/3 mile circuits "murderdromes".[17]

The 1913 motorcycle championship races were moved to a dirt track because dirt was safer.[28]

The national organization overseeing motorcycle racing banned all competitions on board tracks shorter than 1-mile (1.6 km) in 1919.[29] One by one, the manufacturers withdrew their support due to the negative publicity.[25]

The end of board tracks

A major contributor to the demise of board tracks was the high cost of maintenance. There was no suitable wood preservative available, and depending on climate, tracks needed new boards every five years on average.[19]

Resurfacing required as much as a million board feet of new lumber per 1.25 miles (2.01 km) of track, which would have cost around $125,000 at the prices prevalent at the time.[19]

Thus, during the last decade of the board tracks, carpenters would repair the tracks from below, sometimes even during a race, while the cars raced overhead at 120 mph (190 km/h) or faster.[23]

An additional factor was that as speeds increased, overtaking became more difficult - the fastest car would almost always win the race, as long as it held together long enough to finish.

This led to spectators turning their attention to the less-predictable racing that was taking place on dirt tracks.[30]

Though board tracks disappeared from the National Championship scene in 1932, a few smaller tracks did continue to operate for some years afterward.

For instance, the Coney Island Velodrome hosted midget racing until at least 1939, and Castle Hill Speedway in the Bronx ran midgets into the 1940s.[31][32]

Source: Wikipedia.org 


Somebody Come and Play! Earn as You Learn, Grow as You Go!

The Man Inside the Man
from
Sinbad the Sailor Man
A
JMK's Production

 

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Somebody Come and Play in "Traffic" with me. If you would like to "Join" A Growing Biz Op! Here is Your Chance to get in an Earn While You Learn to Do "The Thing" with us all here at Traffic Authority.

Simply click this link and Grow as you Go Come and Play In Traffic With Me and My Team at Traffic Authority!

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100 Year Old BSA~ "Starting On Its 100th Birthday"

Uploaded on Apr 12, 2011

It left BSA works on 12th April 1911. This video shows it starting on its 100th birthday (12th April 2011). It was restored by David Pattison after lying in a shed for 86 years. It is believed to be the oldest BSA in the world. Its frame number is 247.

Starting up a 100 Year Old BSA on Its 100th Birthday! 

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Daimler Reitwagen~ "The First Motorcycle?"



Uploaded on Jul 30, 2011

Specifications: wood frame, handlebar steering, 36'' wheelbase, 110
lbs., single cylinder engine, vertical, air cooler, full stroke 58 X
100 mm, hot tube ignition, 2:1 compression ratio, 16 cu. in., 0.5
horsepower, single belt drive transmission, no reverse.

Note:
http://www.stanleymotorcarriage.com/SteamPacingBike/index.htm
Thanks for the comments :P

The Daimler Reitwagen ("riding wagon") or Einspur ("single track") was a motor vehicle made by Gottlieb Daimler and Wilhelm Maybach in 1885, and is widely recognized as the first motorcycle.[3][4][5] Daimler is often called "the father of the motorcycle" for this invention.[6][7][8] Even when the three steam powered two wheelers that preceded the Reitwagen, the Michaux-Perreaux and Roper of 1867–1869, and the 1884 Copeland, are considered motorcycles, it remains nonetheless the first gasoline internal combustion motorcycle,[9][10][11] and the forerunner of all vehicles, land, sea and air, that use its overwhelmingly popular engine type.[12][13][14][15]


 
Uploaded on Sept. 29, 2010

This is a high quality shortened version of the video.


First motorcycle?

The Reitwagen's status as the first motorcycle rests on whether the definition of motorcycle includes having an internal combustion engine.

The Oxford English Dictionary uses this criterion.[16] The use of four wheels instead of two also raises doubts.[1][11] Even if the outriggers are understood only as auxiliary stabilizers, they point to a deeper issue in bicycle and motorcycle dynamics, in that Daimler's test bed needed the training wheels because it did not employ the principles, well understood in 1884, of rake and trail.[14][17]

For this and other reasons motoring author David Burgess-Wise called the Daimler-Maybach "a crude makeshift", saying that "as a bicycle, it was 20 years out of date."[18] Cycle World's Technical Editor Kevin Cameron, however, maintains that steam power was a dead end and the Reitwagen was the first motorcycle because it hit upon the successful engine type, saying, "History follows things that succeed, not things that fail."[14]

Though it is rarely mentioned in motorcycle history, Enrico Bernardi's 1882 one-cylinder petrol-engined tricycle, the Motrice Pia, could claim priority, as the first gasoline internal combustion motorcycle.[19][20]



Daimler Reitwagen
Daimler Reitwagen
A Reitwagen replica at the Mercedes-Benz Museum
Manufacturer Gottlieb Daimler and Wilhelm Maybach
Also called Einspur "single track"
Fahrzeug mit gas bezw. Petroleum Kraftmaschine "Vehicle with gas or petrol engine"
Production 1885
Assembly Stuttgart
Engine 264 cc (16.1 cu in) air-cooled four-stroke single. Crank start.
Bore / Stroke 58 mm × 100 mm (2.3 in × 3.9 in)
Top speed 7 mph (11 km/h)[1][2]
Power 0.5 hp (0.37 kW) @ 600 rpm[1][2]
Ignition type Hot tube
Transmission Single speed, belt drive (1885)
Two speed, belt primary, pinion gear final drive (1886)
Frame type Wood beam
Suspension None
Brakes Front: none
Rear: shoe
Tires Iron over wood rim, wood spokes.
Rake, Trail 0°, 0 mm
Weight 198 lb (90 kg)[1] (dry)

 

 

Development

Drawings from 1884 showed a twist grip belt tensioner, complex steering linkage and used a belt drive. The working model had a simple handlebar and used a pinion gear 
drive.
 
"The first motorcycle looks like an instrument of torture", wrote Melissa Holbrook Pierson, describing a vehicle that was created along the way to Daimler's real goal, a four wheeled car, and earning him credit as the inventor of the motorcycle "malgré lui," in spite of himself.[21]

Daimler had founded an experimental workshop in the garden shed behind his house in Cannstatt district of Stuttgart in 1882.[22] Together with his employee Maybach they developed a compact, high-speed single-cylinder engine, patented on April 3, 1885 and called "grandfather clock engine."[23][24]

 It had a float metered carburetor, used mushroom intake valves which were opened by the suction of the piston's intake stroke, and instead of an electrical ignition system, it used hot tube ignition, a platinum tube running into the combustion chamber, heated by an external open flame.[10] It could also run on coal gas.[4] It used twin flywheels and had an aluminum crankcase.[13]

The Daimler-Maybach grandfather clock engine of 1886
 
Daimler's and Maybach's next step was to install the engine in a test bed to prove the viability of their engine in a vehicle.[13]

Their goal was to learn what the engine could do, and not to create a motorcycle; it was just that the engine prototype was not yet powerful enough for a full size carriage.[10][22] The original design of 1884 used a belt drive, and twist grip on the handlebars which applied the brake when turned one way and tensioned the drive belt, applying power to the wheel, when turned the other way.[22]

 Roper's velocipede of the late 1860s used a similar two way twistgrip handlebar control.[25][26] The plans also called for steering linkage shafts that made two right angle bends connected with gears, but the actual working model used a simple handlebar without the twist grip or gear linkage.[27] The design was patented on August 29, 1885.[28]

It had a 264-cubic-centimetre (16.1 cu in) single-cylinder Otto cycle four-stroke engine mounted on rubber blocks, with two iron tread wooden wheels and a pair of spring-loaded outrigger wheels to help it remain upright.[13] Its engine output of 0.5 horsepower (0.37 kW) at 600 rpm gave it a speed of about 7 miles per hour (11 km/h).[1]

Daimler's 17-year-old son, Paul, rode it first on November 18, 1885, going 5–12 kilometres (3.1–7.5 mi), from Cannstatt to Untertürkheim in Stuttgart, Germany.[3][22] The seat caught fire on that excursion,[1][22] the engine's hot tube ignition being located directly underneath.[29]

Over the winter of 1885–1886 the belt drive was upgraded to a two-stage, two-speed transmission with a belt primary drive and the final drive using a ring gear on the back wheel.[22] By 1886 the Reitwagen had served its purpose and was abandoned in favor of further development on four wheeled vehicles.[22]


Replicas

The original Reitwagen was destroyed in the Cannstatt Fire that razed the Daimler-Motoren-Gesellschaft Seelberg-Cannstatt plant in 1903,[30] but several replicas exist in collections at the Mercedes-Benz Museum in Stuttgart, the Deutsches Museum in Munich, the Honda Collection Hall at the Twin Ring Motegi facility in Japan,[31] the AMA Motorcycle Hall of Fame in Ohio,[30] and in Melbourne, Australia.[32]

 The Deutsches Museum lent their replica to the Guggenheim Las Vegas The Art of the Motorcycle exhibition in 2001.[2] The replicas vary as to which version they follow. The one at the AMA Hall of Fame is larger than the original and uses the complex belt tensioner and steering linkage seen in the 1884 plans,[27][30] while the Deutsches Museum's replica has the simple handlebar, as well as the ring gear on the rear wheel.[2]

Source: Wikipedia 

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ElliptiGO Outdoor Elliptical Running Device


ElliptiGO Outdoor Elliptical Running Device.

Beats pounding the pavement I Guess?

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The Largest Group of the Oldest Running Harleys' That I Have Ever Seen

 
Uploaded on Feb 14, 2010
Oldest running harleys in the world. spotted in 2003 in Milwaukee
Bruce Lynsdave? and Joe gardella? im still looking to contact these people.

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1913 Harley Davidson Classic

Uploaded on Jul 9, 2010
1929Brough

One of the finest examples of a pre WW1 Harley Davidson to exist. All original and in perfect running condition.

Vintage 1913 Harley Davidson Classic Antique Wonder.

Motorcycle history begins in the second half of the 19th century. Motorcycles are descended from the "safety bicycle," a bicycle with front and rear wheels of the same size and a pedal crank mechanism to drive the rear wheel.[1] Despite some early landmarks in its development, motorcycles lack a rigid pedigree that can be traced back to a single idea or machine. Instead, the idea seems to have occurred to numerous engineers and inventors around Europe at around the same time.


The 1900 Werner Brothers patented motorcycle

Early pioneers

Steam power

Lucius Copeland 1894
 
In the 1860s Pierre Michaux, a blacksmith in Paris, founded 'Michaux et Cie' ("Michaux and company"), the first company to construct bicycles with pedals called a velocipede at the time, or "Michauline".[2] The first steam powered motorcycle, the Michaux-Perreaux steam velocipede, can be traced to 1867, when Pierre's son Ernest Michaux fitted a small steam engine to one of the 'velocipedes'.[3]

The design went to the USA when Pierre Lallement, a Michaux employee who also claimed to have developed the prototype in 1863, filed for the first bicycle patent with the U.S. patent office in 1866.[4] In 1868 an American, Sylvester H. Roper of Roxbury, Massachusetts developed a twin-cylinder steam velocipede, with a coal-fired boiler between the wheels. Roper's contribution to motorcycle development ended suddenly when he died demonstrating one of his machines in Cambridge, Massachusetts on June 1, 1896.[3]

Also in 1868, a French engineer Louis-Guillaume Perreaux patented a similar steam powered single cylinder machine, the Michaux-Perreaux steam velocipede, with an alcohol burner and twin belt drives, which was possibly invented independently of Roper's. Although the patent is dated 1868, nothing indicates the invention had been operable before 1871.[3]

In 1881, Lucius Copeland of Phoenix, Arizona designed a much smaller steam boiler which could drive the large rear wheel of an American Star high-wheeler at 12 mph. In 1887 Copeland formed the Northrop Manufacturing Co. to produce the first successful 'Moto-Cycle' (actually a three-wheeler).[3]


Petroleum power

Replica of the 1885 Daimler-Maybach Reitwagen
 
The Reitwagen was designed and built by the German inventors Gottlieb Daimler and Wilhelm Maybach in Bad Cannstatt, near Stuttgart, in 1885. It was the first petroleum-powered vehicle, running on a light gasolene.[5]

Previous engines designed by Nikolaus Otto had been powered by town gas.[5] The German name Reitwagen means "riding car". Daimler created this machine solely as a testbed to prove that his Grandfather Clock engine could work in a vehicle.[6][7]


First commercial products

In the decade from the late 1880s, dozens of designs and machines emerged, particularly in France, Germany and England, and soon spread to America.[8] During this early period of motorcycle history, there were many manufacturers since bicycle makers were adapting their designs for the new internal combustion engine.

In 1894, the Hildebrand & Wolfmüller became the first motorcycle available to the public for purchase.[9] However, only a few hundred examples of this motorcycle were ever built. Soon, as the engines became more powerful and designs outgrew the bicycle origins, the number of motorcycle-oriented producers increased.

The first known motorcycle in the United States was said to be brought to New York by a French circus performer, in 1895. It weighed about 200 lb (91 kg) and was capable of 40 mph (64 km/h) on a level surface.[10]

However, that same year, an inventor from the United States, E.J. Pennington, demonstrated a motorcycle of his own design in Milwaukee. Pennington claimed his machine was capable of a speed of 58 mph (93 km/h), and is credited with inventing the term "motor cycle" to describe his machine.[11]

The 20th century

Before World War II

A 1913 FN (Fabrique National), Belgium, 4cylinders and shaft drive
 
In 1901 English quadricycle and bicycle maker Royal Enfield introduced its first motorcycle, with a 239 cc engine mounted in the front and driving the rear wheel through a belt. In 1898, English bicycle maker Triumph decided to extend its focus to include motorcycles, and by 1902, the company had produced its first motorcycle—a bicycle fitted with a Belgian-built engine.

 In 1903, as Triumph's motorcycle sales topped 500, the American company Harley-Davidson started producing motorcycles.

In 1901, the Indian Motocycle Manufacturing Company, which had been founded by two former bicycle racers, designed the so-called "diamond framed" Indian Single, whose engine was built by the Aurora Firm in Illinois per Indian's specifications. The Single was made available in the deep blue. Indian's production was up to over 500 bikes by 1902, and would rise to 32,000, its best ever, in 1913.

During this period, experimentation and innovation were driven by the popular new sport of motorcycle racing, with its powerful incentive to produce tough, fast, reliable machines. These enhancements quickly found their way to the public’s machines.[8]



A 1923 BMW R32, with a shaft-drive, boxer twin engine
 
Chief August Vollmer of the Berkeley, California Police Department is credited with organizing the first official police motorcycle patrol in the United States in 1911.[12] By 1914, motorcycles were no longer just bicycles with engines; they had their own technologies, although many still maintained bicycle elements, like the seats and suspension.

A pre-war Polish Sokół 1000
 
An historic V-twin American motorcycle — a 1941 Crocker
 
Until the First World War, Indian was the largest motorcycle manufacturer in the world. After that, this honor went to Harley-Davidson, until 1928 when DKW took over as the largest manufacturer. BMW motorcycles came on the scene in 1923 with a shaft drive and an opposed-twin or "boxer" engine enclosed with the transmission in a single aluminum housing.

By 1931, Indian and Harley-Davidson were the only two American manufacturers producing commercial motorcycles.[13] This two-company rivalry in the United States remained until 1953, when the Indian Motorcycle factory in Springfield, Massachusetts closed and Royal Enfield took over the Indian name.[14]

There were over 80 different makes of motorcycle available in Britain in the 1930s, from the familiar marques like Norton, Triumph and AJS to the obscure, with names like New Gerrard, NUT, SOS, Chell and Whitwood,[15] about twice as many motorcycle makes competing in the world market during the early 21st century.

In 1937, Joe Petrali set a new land speed record of 136.183 mph (219.165 km/h) on a modified Harley-Davidson 61 cubic inch (1,000 cc) overhead valve-driven motorcycle.[13] The same day, Petrali also broke the speed record for 45 cubic inch (737 cc) engine motorcycles.

In Europe, production demands, driven by the buildup to World War II, included motorcycles for military use, and BSA supplied 126,000 BSA M20 motorcycles to the British armed forces, starting in 1937 and continuing until 1950. Royal Enfield also produced motorcycles for the military, including a 125 cc lightweight motorcycle that could be dropped (in a parachute-fitted tube cage) from an aircraft.


After World War II

More History at Wikipedia 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorcycle_history


Source: Wikipedia

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Friday, November 16, 2012

What is the StreetStrider?


What is the StreetStrider?

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Wednesday, November 14, 2012

1896 Henry Ford´s~ Quadricycle (1896) [Replica]


The Ford Quadricycle was the first vehicle developed by Henry Ford. Ford's first car was a simple frame with an ethanol-powered engine and four bicycle wheels mounted on it.[3]

The earliest cars were hand built, one by one, and very expensive. The peculiar machines were seen as toys for the rich.[3] In the 1890s, the "horseless carriage" was a relatively new idea, with no one having a fixed, universal idea of what a car should look like or how it should work. Most of the first car builders were inventors, rather than businessmen, working with their imaginations and the parts they had on hand.[3]

 Thus, the invention of the Quadricycle marks an important innovation as a proto-automobile that would lay the foundation for future, more practical designs to follow.

On June 4, 1896 in a tiny workshop behind his home on 58 Bagley Street,[2] Ford put the finishing touches on his pure ethanol-powered motor car. After more than two years of experimentation, Ford, at the age of 32, had completed his first experimental automobile. He dubbed his creation the "Quadricycle," so named because it ran on four bicycle tires, and/or because of the means through which the engine drove the back wheels.[4]

The success of the little vehicle led to the founding of the Henry Ford Company and then later the Ford Motor Company in 1903.[5]

The two cylinder engine could produce 4 horsepower.[6] The Quadricycle was driven by a chain. The transmission only had two gears (first for 10 mph (16 km/h), 2nd for 20 mph (32 km/h)) and did not have a reverse gear.

The tiller-steered machine had wire wheels and a 3 US gal (11 L) fuel tank under the seat.[2] Ford test drove it on June 4, 1896, after various test drives, achieving a top speed of 20 mph (32 km/h).[2] Ford would later go on to found the Ford Motor Company and become one of the world's richest men.[3]

Today the original Quadricycle resides at the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Michigan.



Ford Quadricycle
Manufacturer Henry Ford
Also called The horseless carriage
Production 1896-1901 "Ford sold his first Quadricycle* for $200 in 1896 to Charles Ainsley. He later built two more Quadricycles: one in 1899, and another in 1901. He eventually bought his first one back for $60.[1] (according to Ford Museum records)
Successor Ford Model A (1903)
Body style 1-seat
Engine 2 cylinder
Transmission 2-speed (no reverse)[2]
Wheelbase 49 in (1,200 mm)
Curb weight 500 lb (230 kg)[2]
Designer(s) Henry Ford



Source: Wikipedia

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