V-E-V miscellany, April 1980, April 1980

The Vintage Motor Cycle Club now has over 6,000 members; the February issue of its Journal contained an arucle by W. G. McMinnies who won the 1913 Cyclecar GP in a Morgan and who had his Triumph motorcycle and a friend’s Vindec Special timed over the Brooklands’ half-mile before the Track was officially opened. Last year The Accrington Observer had a long piece about early motor vehicles made in that area, especially about the Globe car with its patent foolproof gears, the work of Mr. Hitchon. The Mouldsworth Motor Museum, six miles from Chester, is now open every Sunday from 12 noon to 6 p.m. and includes a replica 1920s garage. The Railton OC has been discussing in its magazine exactly how many Railton cars were produced. News of pre-war Vauxhalls being restored by members of the Vauxhall OC continues to come in and includes a 1931 Cadet and a 1934 Type ASY saloon. K. R. Day, President of the Alvis OC asks us to correct the impression we gave that only the 12/50 Alvis Register will be invited to the special 60th birthday of the Alvis at the July Shelsley Walsh hill-climb and at Alvis Ltd. in Coventry on July 6th — both Club and Register are the guests. In connection with recent references to those clockwork P2 Alfa Romeo tin-plate models and the news that E. R. Hall sold the one he bought in 1926 at a Christie’s Auction not long ago, a reader has sent us a cutting of an advertisement for them, issued in 1928 by H. A. Moore & Co. of Southampton Row, WC, which shows them to have been 20″ in length (other sources quote from 18″ to 21″ long), and to have cost then 25/-. The odd thing is that the advertisement says they were exact replicas of the car in which Campari had just won the Mille Miglia, whereas that race was won by a 1,750 c.c. twin-cam Alfa Romeo sports car. However, be that as it may, the writer has always wanted one of these models but they were too expensive when they were new and now you seldom see them at sensible prices. This year’s International Jowett CC Weekend, which normally has some of the pre-war flat-twins present will take place on May 23rd-25th, at Marton, Middlesbrough. Finally, from the oh dear dept., the Remmant racing GN referred to last month was developed from a road-equipped Légère model, not a Ford-equipped car, and an HE was used to tow-start it; this wasn’t a “two-car” HE as printed, whatever that is. Aeroplane Monthly‘s March issue contained the first part of an interesting article about the Burnelli “Lifting Fuselage” aeroplanes, one of which was able to carry two Essex cars on an aerial sales-tour, a photograph showing these cars to have been the early type of Essex with the square-shape radiator. — W.B.