13 replies to this topic

[gerrit stevens]

In the "old days" the results of the various classes were often combined into a general ranking.
These rankings included also motocycles (tricycles and bicycles). I also noticed the voiturette class sometimes included tri- and bicycles. As I have seen some pictures, these vehicles look more like motorbikes than real cars. Therefore I am thinking about skipping these classes from the car rankings.
Is there anyone who is also thinking about this kind of dilemma?

With respect to this I need some information.

Paul Jamin won in a Bollée voiturette, the Paris-Dieppe race and he also won Paris-Trouville in a Bollée tricycle.
Despite there was a separate tricycle class in Paris-Dieppe I have strong indications the Bollée voiturette was a tricycle too.
Page 54 of Gerald Rose's "A Record Of Motor Racing" quotes; "At Beauvais the Vicomte de Soulier had worked his way to the front on his Bollée tricar, but when eleven minutes ahead his driving tyre burst irreparably, and Jamin on a similar vehicle took the lead".

According to this quote it looks like the voiturette is a tricar. My question. Is a tricar something like a tricycle or more like a real car?

BTW I do not start this thread to deny Paul Jamin one or even two "GP" wins, but I think there is a real difference between motorcycles and autocars.

Gerrit Stevens

[Vitesse2]

Gerrit: perhaps this thread on Quadricycles might help (or confuse!)

[fines]

Before 1899, "Voiturettes" (i.e. the Léon Bollée tricars) were usually billed as "Motor Cycles", not cars ("Voitures"). It wasn't before the (four-wheeled) Decauville "Voiturelle" appeared in that year that these small machines assumed their popular position at the bottom rank of the sport of Automobile Racing.

Over the years, the waters have been successively muddied over what a Voiturette is or should be. To record Paul Jamin as the winner of an Automobile race is absurd, imho. Also, to see F2 and F3000 as the successor of Voiturette Racing is wrong in my view - F3 and FJunior would be more appropriate!

[Hans Etzrodt]

These were the rules:

1896 - Regulations for the Paris - Marseille - Paris race referred mainly to the repair of cars. Each car had to carry an observer chosen by the ACF. The competing vehicles were divided into three classes:
Class A. - Cars.
Series 1 : Cars seating two, three, or four persons.
Series 2 : Cars seating more than four.
Class B. - Motor Cycles weighing less than 150 kg - 330 lb (including tricycles).
Series 1 : Motor Cycles without pedals.
Series 2 : Motor Cycles with pedals.
Class C. - Any vehicle not entering into either of the above classes.

1897 - Regulations for the Marseille - Nice - La Turbie race divided competitors into two classes.
1. All four-wheeled vehicles.
2. All three-wheeled type, tricycles or voiturettes.

1897 - Regulations for the Paris - Trouville race split the event into two classes.
1. Motor cycles weighing less than 200 kg - 441 lb.
2. Cars seating at least two persons side by side.

1898 - Regulations for the Marseille - Nice race, for the first time, separated the little from the big cars.
Class 1. Cars weighing more than 400 kg - 882 lb in running order (known as Heavy Cars).
Class 2. Cars weighing 200 to 400 kg - 441 to 882 lb and two persons side by side (Voiturettes).
Class 3. Motor cycles weighing between 100 kg and 200 kg - 220 to 441 lb; including tricycles.
Class 4. Motor cycles weighing less than 100 kg - 220 lb; included 90 kg - 198 lb De Dion tricycles.

1898 - Regulations for the Paris - Amsterdam race divided cars, motor cycles and divers.
Cars series 1. - seating 2 or 3 persons.
Cars series 2. - seating 4 or 5 persons.
Cars series 3. - seating 6 and more.
Motorcycles 1. - weighing less than 100 kg - 220 lb, seating one person.
Motorcycles 2. - weighing less than 100 kg - 220 lb, seating more than one person.
Motorcycles 3. - weighing between 100 and 200 kg - 220 and 441 lb, seating one person.
Motorcycles 4. - weighing between 100 and 200 kg - 220 and 441 lb, seating more than one person.
"Divers" - all vehicles not entered into the above classes.

1899 - Regulations for the Tour de France divided contestants into three classes.
1. Cars with at least two places side by side and two passengers of 70 kg - 154 lb weight.
2. Motor cycles weighing less than 150 kg - 330 lb.
3. Any vehicle not entering in the above categories.

[gerrit stevens]

Originally posted by Hans Etzrodt
These were the rules:

1896 - Regulations for the Paris - Marseille - Paris race referred mainly to the repair of cars. Each car had to carry an observer chosen by the ACF. The competing vehicles were divided into three classes:
Class A. - Cars.
Series 1 : Cars seating two, three, or four persons.
Series 2 : Cars seating more than four.
Class B. - Motor Cycles weighing less than 150 kg - 330 lb (including tricycles).
Series 1 : Motor Cycles without pedals.
Series 2 : Motor Cycles with pedals.
Class C. - Any vehicle not entering into either of the above classes.


etc..

I understand that were the rules but that is no reason to maintain the non-cars in the rankings. The results I want to collect are about autosport. In most cases cars are at least 4-wheeled vehicles. From the pictures I have seen from tricycles they look more like motorbikes. Therefore I choose not to include them in my results lists.
I have also some doubts.
In 1897 Paul Jamin drove in the cycleclass in Paris-Trouville and he drove in the voiturette class in Paris-Dieppe. Both were Bollée 3hp. vehicles. It looks like these were the same vehicles. How come they were classified in different classes.
Was it a tricyle or was it a voiturette.


Gerrit Stevens

[D-Type]

Could it be that some people considered a Morgan 3-wheeler configuration a voiturette (some would use the term cyclecar). i.e. two undriven wheels at the front and one driven wheel at the rear, steering by steering wheel. On the other hand a machine with one undriven wheel at the front and two driven wheels at the rear and steered by handle bars would be called a tricycle.

Having seen the weird and wonderful configurations that some vehicles had, the only approach is to take the contemporary interpretation.

Is the Morgan 3-wheeler a car? In period it raced against GN's and Austin 7's but in other races it raced against motorcycle combinations in 'three wheeler' races.

Where do we classify a modern quad bike?

[Hans Etzrodt]

Originally posted by gerrit stevens
...but that is no reason to maintain the non-cars in the rankings. The results I want to collect are about autosport. In most cases cars are at least 4-wheeled vehicles. From the pictures I have seen from tricycles they look more like motorbikes...

Gerrit - I agree. A good statement and reason enough for me to have changed now 14 winners between 1898 and 1900 on my little list.

[Kvadrat]

Originally posted by gerrit stevens
In the "old days" the results of the various classes were often combined into a general ranking.
These rankings included also motocycles (tricycles and bicycles). I also noticed the voiturette class sometimes included tri- and bicycles. As I have seen some pictures, these vehicles look more like motorbikes than real cars. Therefore I am thinking about skipping these classes from the car rankings.
Is there anyone who is also thinking about this kind of dilemma?

Originally posted by gerrit stevens
I understand that were the rules but that is no reason to maintain the non-cars in the rankings. The results I want to collect are about autosport. In most cases cars are at least 4-wheeled vehicles. From the pictures I have seen from tricycles they look more like motorbikes. Therefore I choose not to include them in my results lists.

Originally posted by Hans Etzrodt
Gerrit - I agree. A good statement and reason enough for me to have changed now 14 winners between 1898 and 1900 on my little list.

It's old thread and its posters could change their mind but if not let me not to agree with Gerrit. I don't think we may ignore some vehicles in early era which do not correpond to "motor car" definition. It's like learning so called Formula One which - in modern knowledge - in 1950 consisted of 7 races and ignore all other competitions because they wasn't bounced by what is now Bernie's enterprise.

Every kind of motor competition is part of large pattern which is motorsport history. If you can avoid some latter events which can't be considered to be in one of major classes (handicaps, trials and so on) it's imposible to ignore "non cars" in early races and keep correct picture of what used to be then.

Originally posted by fines
Also, to see F2 and F3000 as the successor of Voiturette Racing is wrong in my view - F3 and FJunior would be more appropriate!

Michael, don't you think cyclecar class is predecessor of F3 and FJ?

[gerrit stevens]

Originally posted by Kvadrat

It's old thread and its posters could change their mind but if not let me not to agree with Gerrit. I don't think we may ignore some vehicles in early era which do not correpond to "motor car" definition. It's like learning so called Formula One which - in modern knowledge - in 1950 consisted of 7 races and ignore all other competitions because they wasn't bounced by what is now Bernie's enterprise.

Every kind of motor competition is part of large pattern which is motorsport history. If you can avoid some latter events which can't be considered to be in one of major classes (handicaps, trials and so on) it's imposible to ignore "non cars" in early races and keep correct picture of what used to be then.



Michael, don't you think cyclecar class is predecessor of F3 and FJ?

This is a difficult subject. If you look at pictures of those days you will see that a number of these tricycles (and maybe also quadricycles) look more like motorcycles than cars. The fact that is has more than 2 wheels does not make it a car automatically. Remember sidecars are also motorcycles although Rolf Biland was close to making it a car.
The fact that motorcycles competed together with cars does not make them cars. However it may be possible that some of these tricycles can indeed be looked upon as cars.

Gerrit Stevens

[Kvadrat]

I don't argue your definition of car and motor cycle, I just say that to consider only cars in early events thinking that's the proper way of collecting information on what developed to modern motor racing does not give correct picture of what really happened.

[Terry Walker]

This is a real problem, but not beyond sorting out rationally.

The 1888 Benz is considered the world's first production motor car, even though three-wheeled. The Bollee tricar was also thought of as a car. Until about 1904 or so, the motor car hadn't taken on its definitive characteristics, so there were no hard and fast rules.

Some vehicles will fall into both motorcycle and car categories depending on circumstances.

If there's a motorcycle race, with some tricars (or even Morgan type 3-wheelers) taking part as sidecar outfits, then for my money the tricars are motorcycles in that race. If the same tricars are in a motor car race which doesn't have any two-wheel motorcycles, they are motorcars.

It didn't take long before organisers stopped putting cars and motorcycles in the same race (until the Paris-Dakar revived the idea. )

The main distinction, physically, in my view, is that tri-cars have seats, and either wheel or tiller steering. Motorcycles have saddles, are ridden straddled, and have handlebars. The Bollee tricar had seats and a sort of tiller steering. So in my view it's a car.

The Morgans etc have seats and steering wheels and the designers were making use of a neat sales niche in UK. If it had three wheels it was, for licencing purposes, a motorcycle sidecar, with cheaper licencing fees. Also, for some obscure reason, you got get a licence to drive a motorcycle a year earlier than a car. Don't ask me why. It's why three-wheelers survived in UK until the 1970s and even later.

As an afterthought: in Australia agricultural "quad bikes" are considered to be motorcycles even though they have four wheels. You straddle a saddle, and you have handlebars, not a wheel. That probably helps confuse the issue all over again.

[uechtel]

Car, motorcycle or airplane?

And don´t say it was not a racer...

[Terry Walker]

It's a car. Seats, steering wheel (even though the wheel has bits "missing"). Funny, I forgot about this little beastie's steering arrangement. And yes, a racer! I saw one at a local classic car show recently. Huge fun by the look of it.

(Back in the 1960s a Western Australian driver entered a 360cc Goggomobil in the Caversham six hour sports/touring race. It finished last, but never missed a beat. It was the cute little open sports Australian built Dart version.)

[fines]

Originally posted by Kvadrat
Michael, don't you think cyclecar class is predecessor of F3 and FJ?

No, the Voiturette is. The Cyclecar was, perhaps, the predecessor of the sidecar, or the go-kart at best...

Seriously, this is all a matter of opinion. But if you look at all these early voiturettes, and then think of a Ferrari 500, a March/BMW or a Reynard/Judd, it simply doesn't click with me. An F3 Cooper and a Decauville are soulmates, as are an early Renault and an Ensign LNF3. Formula 2 and 3000 are, in my book at least, the equivalent of the "Voitures Légères", the early Darracqs, Cléments etc. This also goes for the 4CM, 6CM and 4CL Masers of the thirties etc.