Topic

R type circa.1935 - stuck on an interesting fact through

T

Yep spot on. Interesting facts could have been:

Also first (and I think only) MG to have a "Y" backbone chassis, and was developed as the Q type, with a conventional chassis, wasn't man enough to take the ~136 bhp from the supercharged 746cc engine (some cars I believe ran north of 150bhp).

Also the last purpose-built racing model from Abingdon, as factory racing was shut down by Leonard Lord after William Morris sold MG to Morris Motors (up until then it he had privately owned it as a separate company).

Mr Forgetful wrote: wrote:

I think my question was too multi cultural!!

Paul, with your approval I feel this should be set aside and you set another one otherwise we will lose interest.

Machine Gun Kelly and the Red Baron never had such unpopularity and as for for a ruby substitute - well no wonder our sheep sheerer thought cars the future!!

Apologies, too much travelling and enjoying myself at Cholmondeley this weekend.

At a guess I'd say this is to do with Frederick Wolseley and his general manager, Herbert Austin, and their involvement in sheep shearing machines. Austin also had an involvement with Sir Hiram Maxim.

For more details:

Irish born Frederick York Wolseley went to Sydney, Australia aged 17 in 1887 and founded the Wolseley Sheep Shearing Machine Company Ltd. in Sydney on 25th October 1887. While in Australia he worked at many jobs including being a station owner with a large number of sheep. He returned to Britain in 1889 after suffering manufacturing shortcomings from his sub-contractors. He set up at 58 Broad Street in Birmingham. Wolseley resigned in 1894. Herbert Austin, who had been manager of a engineering company in Australia, had suggested improvements to the shearing machines and returned to England in 1893 as a Wolseley employee. He was employed as an engineering inspector. Austin arranged the move in 1895 to larger premises at Sydney Works, Alma Street, Aston, Birmingham. In around 1896 Austin travelled to France to look at their motor industry. He liked the Léon-Bollée three-wheel voiturette and was soon building his own version, called the "Autocar Number One". It was advertised at £110 (UK Pounds) but only one was made. His second car was completed in 1897. A new company was formed in 1901; The Wolseley Tool & Motor Car Company Ltd. under the auspices of Vickers Sons & Maxim Ltd. and a new factory at Adderley Park, Birmingham was acquired to build Wolseley cars. In their first year Wolseley built 323 cars at the Birmingham factory while further cars were produced at the Crayford site. The Birmingham factory had been constructed in 1897 for Starley Brothers & Westwood Ltd. who were in the cycle trade. Austin applied for his first patents from these works in May 1901 for a handbrake mechanism and a pre-selector gearbox. Austin also patented a central steering motor body in January 1902.

Austin helped Sir Hiram Maxim (Inventor of the machine-gun) build a giant steam plane during the 1890's and Maxim's associates, Vickers, Sons & Maxim bought Wolseleys car division during 1901.

Plans were submitted to enlarge the works in February 1902 and further expansion occurred in most of the following years. Herbert Austin resigned in 1905 to start the Austin Motor Company Ltd. in Longbridge. Design now came under Siddeley influence and cars were marketed as Wolseley-Siddeleys.

After Austin left the company Alfred Remington made the patent applications. Remington was a draughtsman with The Wolseley Sheep Shearing Machine Company in 1900 and by 1902 was its Chief Draughtsman. Born in 1877 Remington designed the first submarine to use an internal combustion engine. He left Wolseley in 1920 due to ill health and died in 1922.

By 1909 Wolseley were building engines for rail cars, aircraft and marine uses. During the years 1909 and 1910 they expanded into the adjacent premises, Britannia Works, which had previously been used by Brown, Marshalls & Company Ltd. who had built railway carriages and were also waggon builders. (NB: double "G" is the correct spelling).

150 BHP out 748cc in 1935 would be frightening.....

do you have any other good questions as i have to do some work now and I don't want to hold up thread.

T

OK, I just had some inspiration. Historically MG engines bays had been, at best, somewhat difficult to work on, with the minimum of room required to fit the engine in, but not enough to let anyone actually work on it whilst it was in there (think MGA).

Why, then, did the MGB have such a spacious engine bay?

Because it was intended to have a V4 engine?

Yep, more or less, V4 was one of the options considered, along with a 2.0l OHC engine (alloy one, I think). The V4 was being considered as a replacement for the B series as part of a modular family of V engines, so the MGC could have got the V6 version later on but it wasn't meant to be.

Is that the right answer, then, are you looking for a new question? Just waiting for Mr Forgetful to also comment on my reply to his, too, and as for the Gene Hackman picture, the only link I can see is an MG 1100 in the backgroun dof a scene from that movie so with so many questions outstanding, I will await further instructions to post.

Yep that is the correct answer. My "more or less" was referring to the fact that MG/BMC were evaluating options for powerplants for the B, of which the V4 was one, rather than the only one.

As far as I'm concerned it's question time from you

Looking forward to this next weekend, what is significant about the number 58?

Number of FIA spec MGBs entered in the celebration race, marking 50 years of the 'B

Over to you!