VSCC Welsh DTs and Trial

THIS traditional event the Edwardian and Light Can Section of the VSCC took place, in the usual form, over the weekend of March 27th/28th, the time-change coinciding with a very good imitation of summer but the date giving Sir Geoffrey Howe a number of one-month’s extra licence fees in return for a few days on the road. Nevertheless, a full entry was received, including the Zust and Clegg-Darracq Edwardians of Collings and Knight. The tests took place in the grounds of the Abernant Lake Hotel at Llanwrtyd Wells, which was HQ for the dinner and prizegiving, at which we enjoyed a very amusing speech by past President James Crocker. The Sunday trial embraced seven well-chosen hills, three of them in the fields adjacent to Llwynbarried Hall, hence the name of the premier trophy, with the finish at Newbridge-on-Wye.

Mechanical casualties were confined to a chewed-up propeller-shaft on Keith JeddereFisher’s Fiat 509A and delicate front springs and a slipping leather cone clutch tin Brian Harris’ Mk.I Riley 9. As at the “Wessex”, a centre of interest was Branislav Sudjic’s flat-twin Tatra saloon. Two smart French small cars were Tony Carlisle’s Type KJ1 Renault and Alan Fsskine’s 5cv Citroen. A contingent of 18 Austin 7s failed to wrest the Llwynbarried Trophy from Keith Hill

Results

M szarge 1913 singe, N. :Awn :1,.t..r:unthert. rnilltps :1925

11923″I’ltrrint7.”Ir°4=s* it’19}Irdluis9t’,!trttlir);g(t!rtfe’,1171’6′ Humbert. r.rcilina.ttrl 1=1 :1171VA u’s ZUrAT,t.-rItUr M Shaw ,IV31, Morns, Mrsi.”11. Threlfall ,1924 Threlfall iI924 BSA,. M Elsom 11928 AllStin, Third Class Awards: 5 Price 11929 Austin), Harrts 11929<.p>

V-E-V Miscellany. — A vintage Hupmobile tourer will probably change hands in this country. Another pioneer motor business has closed. Glover’s Garage in Coventry, thought to be the oldest in the town, was formed by the Glover brothers in Spon Street and moved to Windsor Street in 1912, making cyclecars us well as operating as a garage. In 1968 a son of one of the brothers took over and the premises were moved again, to Biggin Hall. Now it has closed down. The Coventry Motor Museum has benefited from loads of vintage spares and such things as Model-T Ford parts, and bumpers from a Humber Super Snipe, etc. were still coming to light, while a 1935 Morris Eight was also sold. The Elf Oil Company has acquired the site. A Pembrokeshire reader wonders what became of the 1922 Rolls-Royce Silver Ghost he drove before he was old enough to have a driving licence, when apprenticed to the Mayhill Garage in Monmouth in the mid-1930s.

The garage had bought this Rolls-Royce, a 1928 Chrysler, a 1928 Essex, a 1930 Austin Sixteen and a 1929 Fiat for use as hire-cars. Our correspondent thinks hr may be the youngest person to have driven a 1922 40/50 Rolls-Royce on the road, at the age of lb. He has made every endeavour to discover the lute of the car, which was first owned by Sir David Llewellyn, Bt., of Sr. Fagen’s Castle, in Cardiff, Reg. No. NY 743, but not having the engin, 05 chassis nos., has run into a blank wall, which he never did in his driving days. Can anyone help? Letters can be forwarded. An American reader who is researching Hudson-Essex history tells us that the design of the F-head Essex engine Was done in Detroit for Hudson, but their engincenng staff, Emil Huber, a Swiss, being responsible for the design of the i.o.e. cylinder head, Steven Fekete, a Hungarian, helping, and Stuart Baits, who became Vice-President of Hudson-Essra, doing the draughtsmanship. So there %Sere European origins to the Essex engine design. Down anyone have anything to add?

The Vintage Austin Club’s magazine for Ara’ contained two photographs and an article by Freddie Henry, showing how the body shells nf the pre-war Ausrtn 12/6 spans-saloon and such contemporary German cars as the 1934 Adler (arenas a German Grand Prix car park’ and 9a, Hanomag were virtually the same, all being supplied by Ambi-Budd of Berlin. a Coral’s.’ partly-owned by Budd of America, which in tura then owned half of the Pressed Steel Cort,oratra.. Lord Nuffield owning the other half; this .inspite of the German cars having front-whee)dnve ho the Austin rear-wheel-drive. Henry discovered this when he drove to the Adler factory in an Austin 12,6. a Monte Carlo Rally car, in 1934. A reader living in Kent seeks information about a brougham-bodied Rolls-Royce TWCII, he recently acquired. It is registered KO 03, she ,bod.nyedis bbyyLaLtonv(eitillt.idknmiammi.,unsdot,hit.h. cair,wmaesitu,r, millionaire, J. B. Joel, who kept it in London. A reminder — National Alvin Day is at Knebworth House, near Hitchin, on May 16th. The owner of a 1939 4.3-litre Alvin with a drop-head coupe body by Offord & Sons, for which the original registration number has been lost, wonders whether anyone remembers such a car or has photographs showing the registration number: he is a member of the Alvin DC. Letters can be forwarded. — W. B.