VETERAN CAR GUIDE including Daimler. The early MMC and Daimler shared many characteristics including the 4hp twin-cylinder vertical engines, steering and ignition. George Iden joined the company, and in 1899 new designs were available with rear-mounted horizontal-twin engines and side gear change. By 1902, the engines were front mounted with one, two or four cylinders. The company faced restructurings and financial constraints leading to modest output.
Mobile The Mobile Motor & Engineering Co. Ltd., of John Bright Street, Birmingham first exhibited a single example of its motor cars at The Agricultural Show in April 1903. The product range had expanded considerably by November that year, when there was a three-speed 6hp tubular-chassis voiturette, a 9hp version, priced at 235 guineas, and a twin-cylinder model that was equipped with the 12hp Aster-engine and priced at £ 350. The Mobile company entered two vehicles into the Hereford trials in 1904, and both performed well, with each car achieving seven nonstop runs, out of a maximum of 12. The 9hp entry was given an honorary mention for its general performance as a four-seated vehicle. Between 1905 and 1907, the company advertised several increasingly largerengined vehicles, including one rated as 20— 22hp. All the company’ s vehicles were manufactured by Lacoste & Battmann in Paris. The assets of the Mobile company were acquired by Calthorpe in 1907.
Mors The Paris-based Mors company initially manufactured petrol-engined railway inspection cars, and then produced a motor car based on the designs of Henri Brasier, an employee at the time. It used low tension coil and dynamo ignition. A later development included V4 engines with water-cooled heads and air-cooled barrels that were rear-mounted. By 1898, production was growing rapidly, and the‘ Petit Duc’ was launched with a smaller, front-mounted 850cc flat twin-cylinder engine and final drive by side chains. Full water cooling was adopted in 1902, and from 1903, vertical engines were standard. Models introduced in 1903 had four-cylinder T-head engines, Mercedes-like honeycomb radiators, chain drive and pressed steel chassis. The 1904 engine options included an 8.1 litre 40 / 25hp model.
Napier At the beginning of 1898 Selwyn Edge, manager of the Dunlop Pneumatic Tyre Company, acquired the Panhard‘ Old Number 8’, the second placed car in the 1896 Paris-Marseilles race. He enlisted the services of Montague Napier at David Napier & Son,
1901 Mors
to undertake various modifications and improvements to the car. These were caried out to Edge’ s satisfaction and by 1900 Napier were building complete cars for competition and later for normal road use. The first Napier distinguished itself in the Thousand Mile Trial of 1900, driven by Edge. Other racing cars were built, the most famous being a 30hp, four-cylinder car that won the Gordon Bennett Race for Great Britain in 1902. In 1903, Napier built 250 cars, and needed to expand from his Lambeth premises to Acton, London. In October, the company announced the 18 / 30hp sixcylinder range that became its trademark, and by 1906 Napier had an all six-cylinder product range.
Napoleon Mr Bernard Neave of London displayed a Napoleon at the Crystal Palace Motor Show in 1903, that was manufactured by the Paris-based Lacoste et Battmann Co., using a De Dion Bouton 6hp engine.
New Orleans This was a Belgian Vivinus voiturette built under licence in Orleans Road, Middlesex, by H. G. Burford and Dutchman Johannes Van Toll. The car had a front-mounted 3.5hp single-cylinder engine with belt transmission to fast and loose pulleys on a countershaft and then by spur gears to the rear axle. A 6hp two-cylinder car was available at the end of 1900, and in 1901 came a 7hp model with water cooling and three forward gears. Both tubular frames and flitch-plate chassis were used. For 1903, there was a tubular-framed 9hp twin-cylinder and a flitch plate 14hp four-cylinder range. It is possible that components were still sourced in Belgium from Vivinus.
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