World’s Oldest Car Headed For Auction

The Winding Road ^ | June 28th, 2007 | unknown

[Daffynition]

The world’s oldest running car is set to cross the auction block at Pebble Beach in August.

The catchy-sounding De Dion-Bouton et Trapardoux was built in France in 1884, and amazingly, it’s a three owner car. Among its many credentials, “La Marquise” is a steam-powered four-wheeled car that is believed to have won the first automobile race.

Top speed on the car is a startlingly high 38 miles-per-hour, which must feel decidedly exciting given its primitive construction and solid rubber tires. To reach that heady speed, drivers need to first stoke the car with coal, wood, paper, or other readily combustible materials, and then wait for around a half-hour to generate enough steam for the car to get rolling.

The De Dion-Bouton et Trapardoux is expected to hammer for between $1.5 and $2 million.

[Muleteam1]

Yes, I have wished many times that my Dodge was a Ford or a Chevy but since it is a family car, I guess I'm sort of stuck with it.

Your knowledge of auto mechanics obviously is far in advance of mine. I was a desk-bound wildlife biologist for the past twenty five years although I come from a long family line of auto mechanics and gunsmiths. Also while in high school in the 1960s, I built a 1956 Ford Fairlane that is remembered by my old high school contemporaries when they can't seem to recall me. I'm just returning to something in my retirement that has always been a love of mine and appears to come naturally.

Your comment about using Ferguson tractor sleeves on a TR3 is amusing. Although I had one of the little TO30 Fergusons which I never restored, I have refurbished several of the very similar Ford 8n tractors in the past five years. Here a some pics of a few of the tractors I've done since retirement. The little 8n also has a sleeved engine. Very easy to rebuild.

[devolve]

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Restoration can be therapeutic and a great hobby

So you kmow the O-ring sealed cylinder sleeves

TR used to tell reuilders to even rotate sleever 90° if the started to get wslightly oval shaped to save bucks if the sleeve was othwise in decent shape

I rcall some guys used piston rings a bit to hard and forever waiting for them to seal and forever expect the initial oil butning to stop

Now a great range of parts and suprior oils makes that no problmo

I recall an Allis-Chalmers tractor w bought that started on gasoine and then swapped to tractor fuel after it started and warmed up

Ak of this alternative fuel and hybrid stuff the Greenies spout as “new” is a joke

Farmers in South Florida ran fuel lines aroud exhaust manifolds on boneyrd Buick engines for pumping water in and out of ditches onto crops - not burning pump gasoline either - and often run day and night in hurrican seasons

[potlatch]

[Restoration can be therapeutic and a great hobby]

True. I even imagine at times that once a car or other vehicle has been restored and the inital elation wears off, there may even be a sense of ‘let down’.

[devolve]

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I was always trying something to make vehices run faster, ride better, handle better

I never obcessed about having the body or paint in concours mint condition

If I could not drive it on salted ice or snow or in the rain it was useless to me

It’s a car

Not a bronze statue or an oil painting

I’d never collect oil paintings either

Antique Colt handguns - well.....

[potlatch]

Lol, ‘it’s a gun’!!

We all have our ‘collectors choices’. One thing, if I have a good car, I am happy with it and don’t yearn for a new one like many do. Only when it starts getting troublesome.

[Muleteam1]

I've got more retirement projects than I can do but you are right, the work is mind-soothing and quite often profitable. My most recent venture was an old Suzuki moped that I picked up for almost nothing and which had not run in ten or more years. All the control cables were stuck fast and the kick starter was not engaging the engine. In two days I had it starting on the first kick and was riding it to and from my shop although I'm sure I look like a large circus clown on one of those tiny circus bicycles. Every kid in this small town has tried to buy the thing from me. All I have in the darn thing is a set of reflectors, a new seat cover, and my time which I have been told by younger men is almost worthless at my age.

Agreed on the "greenies" lack of knowledge of earlier times and technology in America. Out here on the Texas Panhandle, many of the farms early in the 20th century had wind generators.

I blew a front brake line on my old GMC truck this afternoon so I know what I will be doing in the morning.

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

Al Gore will be so proud of you. After all, he thinks the internal combustion engine is Satan.

[Muleteam1]

>>I even imagine at times that once a car or other vehicle has been restored and the inital elation wears off, there may even be a sense of ‘let down’.<<

This is true but the elation returns when a buyer pulls out that big roll of cash. : )

[Oberon]

Much Model A stuff is made today, it's true.

Here's something that's along the same lines, but a little more exclusive...ever hear of a Model AA? That's me at the wheel.

My grandfather bought this for a farm truck in 1955, and for the next 20 years it hauled hay bales, rocks, firewood, lumber, whatever needed hauling. Then in the '70s he had it restored more or less, and parked it in the garage. Now here it is. It belongs to my dad now.

It's like a Model A, only different if that makes any sense. It uses the standard Model A 200-cube 4-banger with Zenith single-pot carb, but it has oversize steel wheels with real truck tires. The differential uses a worm drive for over 5:1 final drive ratio, yielding a top speed somewhere south of 40 mph...and it's not happy going that fast.

Rear suspension consists of sixteen leaf springs per side. You can imagine what the ride is like, but you could load it 'til the springs were flat and it would still go. Not fast, but it would go.

Now, of course, it's relegated to parade duty.

[potlatch]

[ a buyer pulls out that big roll of cash]

Lol, yes I’ll bet so! On the other hand, it may be like giving up the litter of puppies that you’ve seen born and grow. You miss them!

[Muleteam1]

>>Antique Colt handguns - well.....<<

You may know that early American gunsmiths were called "mechanics?" From such terminology was derived the name of Mechanics Hill, NC (now Robbins, NC) which was named for the gun factory owned by my great great great grandfather, David Kennedy (1768-1837).

[Oberon]

...my great great great grandfather, David Kennedy (1768-1837)

You mean, as in Whitworth-Kennedy?

[Muleteam1]

I will admit I've had a couple of 8ns that I had to turn away as they disappeared down the road on their new owner's trailer. Lol!

However, I will never face this dilemma with the old DB coupe. It was given to me on the condition that I would never sell it outside the family. The restoration is entirely for my daughter' family who will undoubtedly sell the car because, as a city dwellers, they will never have a place to keep it.

[Oberon]

Sorry, that's Whitney-Kennedy.

[devolve]

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Mine were from the Connecticut River Valley

Many also came from clockmaker families

The lockworks were something clockmakers were prepared to make and tune

Look up some of your family names on the “surname” pages

This goes way back to the early 1600s

http://Whipple.org

Prosser
Whipple
Frances Cooke
John Cooke
Roosevelt - FDR, TR, etc.
Coolidge
Alden

Lots of clockmakers & gunsmiths here

I also lived in the WNC mountains not far from Mount Mitchell

[Rb ver. 2.0]

Love it!

[Rb ver. 2.0]

Looks like the Walton’s family truck.

[Muleteam1]

I'm not knowledgeable on Whitworth-Kennedy firearms but I believe David Kennedy's guns pre-dated the Whitworth-Kennedys. Didn't Billy the Kid carry a W-K rifle at some point? I'm only about 60 miles from the Kid's burial site so I had heard this story.

Here's a bit of information on the Kennedy muskets made at Robbins from a lady I used to correspond with.

David Kennedy's Rifles

[Oberon]

Looks like the Walton’s family truck.

Based on the photos I can find, the configuration of the Waltons truck was a little different but it appears to be an AA like the one I drove.

[potlatch]

Hopefully they can find some way to keep it for a grandchild. I hope so after all your work.