V-to-C Miscellany, June 1994, June 1994

The International Rally of the Daimler & Lanchester CC is to be staged at Doune Motor Museum in Perthshire on June 12, with supporting events from June 6-13. This well established club continues to publish its professional magazine The Driving Member looking at a picture of a 1927 Daimler 35/120 at the Dutch Rally reminded me of lust how dignified these cars looked, more so, I think, than any other ‘Dowager’s car’ of the period.

Incidentally, in a mileage of 1053. the 35/120 gave 12.7 mpg while a 1925 R1-6/30 hp Daimler returned 13.4 over 861 miles. The magazine is full of interesting articles and good pictures. In one month this club enrolled 26 new members, their cars ranging from a 1921 Lancaster 40 Gill & Son limousine to several MkIll Sovereigns. Usual sections and a spares scheme operate and the membership secretary is John Ridley, The Manor House, Trewyn, Abergavenny, Gwent N17 7PG.

In a recent issue of Saga Magazine broadcaster and crime-writer Ludovic Kennedy wrote of his motoring memories, recalling that at an early age he rode in the family Clyno (TM 5125), a two-seater with dickey, into which he suggests four were crammed within and two more in the outside accomodation.

He wondered whether it is still about, which no doubt the Clyno Register would know. This Clyno took two days on the journey up the Al to Edinburgh (presumably from London) and boiled when climbing Rest-and-Be-Thankful on the way to catch the ferry to Islay. Ludovic Kennedy’s first car was a £25 Austin 7, a contrast ‘to an uncle’s Humber Super Snipe with glass division between chauffeur and passengers. After the war he had a Railton Which is described as having Hudson bodywork but a Ford V8 engine, which is either a lapse of memory or the car was a re-engined hybrid.

The 12,000 strong VMCC has too full a programme for us to list all its 1994 Fixtures, but its Founders Day Rally at Stanford Hall on July 24 is to feature overhead camshaft motorcycles. Founder CE ‘Titch’ Allen is very much in command and the club’s HO at Burton-on-Trent is named after him. He was presented recently by the VMCC’s Chiltern Section with a splendid 8 in long scale-model of the Brough Superior with which Bert Le Vack broke records at Brooklands and Arpajon in 1924. Made by Bert White, the model has working forks and control levers. The VMCC magazine The Vintage Motor Cycle, edited by Dr DIG Styles, is full of interesting articles, the April issue including items on riding flattank machines, the first chain-drive BMW and memories of the delightful 1924 veetwin Raleigh Model-12. Club information from Mrs Ann Davy 10283-5405571.

Last month, in Boddy Language, I wrote of the great and ugly changes that are being inflicted on the approaches to my nearest county town. They are changing a place where you can still see petrol pumps of which the hoses swing out over the pavement, as in vintage times, and a 1911 BSA tourer in a showroom window. . .I also referred to club magazines which have retained their original format over the years.

To those mentioned should be added to the Bugatti OC’s Bugantics edited now by Mrs Pat Preston. The front cover, size and format have remained unchanged since the first printed issue in 1931. And for some considerable time the VCC’s Veteran Car has continued unchanged, edited today by Mrs Elizabeth Bennett. Much the same applies to the ever-welcome Chain Gang Gazette of the Frazer Nash Section of the VSCC and the Brooklands Society Gazette. edited respectively by Mike and Kay Sythes and Rupert Prior. And the Vintage Austin Register has an excellent printed quartetly magazine.

Reverting to last month’s piece about the racing of the Conan Doyle brothers, there was some doubt as to the type of Bugatti one of them raced. I gave it as a Type 39, which is how it was described in contemporary reports, However, it was also called a twin-cam Bugatti and the only 11/7-litre of that kind was the Type 51 A, with supercharger, as Mr PB Merritt, who had a 139 single-cam Bugatti of his own and who, incidentally, has been reading MOTOR SPORT for over 45 years, points out. This set roe off on some more research, which shows that Adrian’s car was, in fact, a 1936 51A, with, according to the late Hugh Conway. engine no 150 in chassis 51160.

Having commented on ruination of the countryside being detrimental to the profitable business known as tourism, I was interested to read in The Klaxon, magazine of the Preston & District VCC, that in the opinion of a contributor a once familiar part of Lancashire has been opencastand landscaped out of all recognition. in a perverse sense losing all its identity and character we once knew and perhaps loved”.

Reading on, I became even more interested when it became clear that these views were prompted by an expedition to try to locate hills used by the Lancashire AC for a two-day trial in 1938 open to the Riley MC and four other clubs, one of which, at Adlington, now close to the M61, was known as Paddy’s Rise, used also for a speed hillclimb where, in 1939, Capt GET Eyston started the competitors.

FTD was set by Guy Warburton, driving his Allard. What is more, the writer has located the sites of what were, it seems, nine of the sections, including Paddy’s Rise. He is anxious to obtain a photograph of the Boatmans Arms, Aberdeen, as it was in the 1920s, another aspect of nostalgia.

The National Motor Museum at Beaulieu has been lent a 1902 Arrol-Johnson dog-cart by Mrs Duncan McCul)och, in memory of her late father who used it for many years. The Michael Sedgwick Memorial Run will take place on June 26 and the 750 MC’s National Austin 7 Rally in the Museum’s grounds on July 3.

We hear that another 30/98 Vauxhall. not heard of for many years, has surfaced here. The VMCC Festival of 1000 Bikes will feature at Brands Hatch on August 13/14; readers who like two-wheelers should contact P Buller, 16 Newmarket Green, Eltham, London, SE9 5ER. Elsewhere, the Riley RM Club’s Welsh Weekend is now at Closglas Farm, Carmarthen, on June 11/12.