Rear-engined Racers

It is not every day that we receive letters from readers in Czechoslovakia, so we were glad to hear from Vladimir Sedlacck about rear-engined racing cars. He queries our assumption that this layout was pioneered by Rumpler and Benz, quoting the 1900 Tatra which finished second in the 1900 Salzburg-Linz-Vienna race and third in the Frankfurt circuit race that year, driven in both events by Theodore von Liebig. This Tatra, says our correspondent, had a horizontally-opposed four cylinder 120X120mm (2,710 cc) engine at the back of the 1,880 mm-wheelbase chassis and the photograph, which unfortunately will not reproduce, shows that there was wheel steering. In running order the weight was 975 kg, and the engine had three valves per cylinder, two automatic inlets and one exhaust, the drive going through a hand and foot-controlled clutch ton four-speed gearbox and side chains. This early Tatra ran on wooden wheels shod at the front with 800 mm diameter tyres, and at the back with 880 mm tyres. We were thinking of later Grand Prix designs when naming the Benz Tropfenwagen of 1923 as the first successful rear or mid-engined racing car; before that a number of rear-engined cars were raced, including the Tatra, and we thank our Czechoslovakian reader for sending us details. WB