Sunday, April 5, 2026

Tire balance and equilibrium




More quirky (and dated) illustrations from Related Science for Automotive Trades by Louis Jensen and William Brazier,  Delmar Publishing, 1958



 

Sidecar Sunday


 Here's a sidecar from an older carousel, much too nicely shaped to be a simple merry go round object. The manufacturer is unknown but German.  A quick Google finds there are still manufacturers making things like this. Technical Park.




 

Saturday, April 4, 2026

Dr. John's single

  Anyone familiar with Moto Guzzi in the 1980s and 90s is aware of Dr. John Wittner, a Philadelphia dentist who modified Guzzi VTwins into racebikes that won championships including the 1987 BOTT (Battle of The Twins). Before he started playing with Guzzis he modified and raced Harley Davidsons. He was also a fan of British singles, owning Gold Stars and Velocettes. 
  This project was his take on a modern American single cylinder sport bike. Starting with a set of stock XLH crankcases, he converted the crankshaft for single cylinder use, blanking off the rear cylinder area. Various mods brought the displacement to 600cc. The transmission is a close ratio box from a KR racer. Using a Lucas headlight and styling licks from the British motorcycle industry giving it a "Clubman" look. The bike worked well, apparently it was faster than either his Velocette and Gold Star while confusing passing Harley and British fans.  


 

We still make things in this country. National Steel Car

1954

 This company is still around, doing what they always did. History at the company website.

Friday, April 3, 2026

Vernier bevel protractor






 Looks like a wallpaper pattern.



DOT race bike


  Here's a 125cc racer from the DOT marque with an usual layout.    No technical details given but for some reason, the Villiers engine is tilted forward 90°, possibly to lower the center of gravity? In any case, the whole bike seems much lower than usual. Wish I had a better view, it's rather unique. They entered this motorcycle in the IoM TT in 1951 and appear to be have been successful on some level, DOT won the team award that year but did not continue the program. This layout was also not used for production bikes.

 The company was founded in 1906. They produced motorcycles until the mid thirties when they settled into making three wheel delivery vehicles. In 1949, they were sufficiently back on their feet to restart motorcycle production, producing a utilitarian two stroke motorcycle that could be modified for trials and scrambles. With the end of Villiers as an engine supplier, they eventually stopped motorcycle production again. More here.






Thursday, April 2, 2026

Dellow Automobiles



 Dellow was a niche automobile company near Birmingham, England, in business between 1950 and 1957. The ads above show the final model, all the images I see are of the earlier vertical grill and separate fenders-type bodies. The cars were originally based on a Austin Seven chassis and were intended as a competitive trials car or sporty little road car. The Austin Seven-based cars were not strong enough for the rough world of trials and there was soon a new chassis with 1200 cc Ford engine and Ford axles, each car produced was different than the one before as improvements were incorporated.

More here

Hagerty



Mark V



Chisels and Chipping

Shop Theory, Henry Ford Trade School, McGraw Hill, 1943

 
Oh yeah, this will definitely be on the test.

Metropolitan police


 Dibs on the Harley!

Tuesday, March 31, 2026

Radical Software #2



  Seems like a hippie new media project. At the time, the term radical software referred to the content of information rather than to a computer program. The cover image was computer-generated, a novelty at the time. 
  The magazine was an outgrowth of the Raindance Corporation in New York during the summer of 1969. Their intention was to found an alternative media think tank; a source of ideas, publications, videotapes and energy providing a theoretical basis for implementing communication tools in the project of social change. The magazine struggled along to number 6 as the founders were seeing the production was a distraction from their overall mission of the Raindance Corporation. 

The whole story here.