From the front — 1

When you see the sports car of today coming towards you it is possible to be mistaken as to its identity due to designers all treading the same aerodynamic efficiency path. In the vintage and post-vintage years each designer endowed his sports car with a very distinctive “face”, which was all centred around the radiator. Probably the most easily recognised is a Bugatti radiator, Ettore Bugatti pulling a master stroke when he opted for the horseshoe shaped radiator.

The radiator became a simple block of cooling element and designers covered it with a cowling which retained the general shape of the old-type radiator, but as the front of the car became more aerodynamic the radiator grille gradually gave way to an efficient opening.

In this new series, which we start this month, we will show each month a full-frontal view of an interesting car of the nineteen-twenties and thirties, none of which can be mistaken for anything other than what they are. The photos are period ones from the Motor Sport archives. — D.S.J.