EVOLUTION OF THE MOTOR VEHICLE.
The term “motor cycle” must finally become broad enough to be motor vehicle, and in five possible forms—the bicycle, single or tandem; the [tricycle], single or double; the four-wheeled carriage, with seats for two, four, or six; the cab or ’bus for public hire; the truck for hauling loads.
The first form cannot be thought likely to assume importance, for notwithstanding the fact that to the practiced and regular rider the bicycle becomes so far like the lower part of the centaur that steering is almost unconscious and the balancing a matter of instinctive bodily sway, it is also true that the constant call for equipoise does somewhat “take it out of” the system, even if the demand is not thought of. To state it in another way, it must be admitted that, if various resistances were not greater on the tricycle and if one could put aside all “feeling” and could regard only physical comfort according to that supposition, the three-tracker would fatigue less. Of course, the supposition can never be real, and as the bicycle must remain the easiest to drive it will hold its place as the vehicle for self-propulsion; but when the question comes up as to the vehicle to supply its own power and to ride upon, not to drive by one’s muscles, its stability, comfort in sitting, strength, and luggage-carrying capacity, will give the tricycle overwhelming advantages, since light weight will cease to be of consequence.
The motor-driven pleasure carriage and the passenger vehicle for hire will come together; indeed, they are already here. The postal van and the delivery wagon for light goods are running in London and Paris. The heavy truck for conveying general merchandise and doing general “carting” is not yet distinctly in sight, but its coming seems to be manifest destiny.
The accompanying illustration of a [bicycle with gasoline motor], from the exhibit of a Coventry firm at the Stanley Show of 1896, is interesting as a stone on the path of development rather than a permanent type. The lengthened wheel base suggests the desirability of the tricycle form, and the level gear from the pedals shows that they are intended only as auxiliary for starting; the same appears in the tricycle shown, which was also very long and was level geared. The cut of a tricycle of present shape and having a gasoline motor is also given because this is now advertised as a market article, by the same firm, but the bicycle has probably dropped out.
The Irish Cyclist of Dec. 8 last, reviewing the National Show, says that “motor cycles are practically non-existent, the only specimen seen being a Bantam, with a rather neatly constructed oil engine ignited by electric spark, which was only exhibited last year.”
The Stanley Show, in the month previous, had a considerable display regarding which the London Cyclist said:
Three electric tandems have storage batteries carried in the frame below the top tube, with a motor in the lower part of the rear frame and on the handlebar a resistance coil to bring speed under control of the rear rider; a similar tandem has been run up to a speed of forty miles an hour, and these machines are for pacing purposes only. (This is emphasized by the recent arrival in New York of the two French professionals, brothers, with their electric tandem, booked to appear on several tracks. The tandem is credited with a fifty mile rate, and perhaps it may not be necessary for any little Michael to call out to the pacemakers on it to “hit it up.”) A road tandem has an oil motor with vertical double cylinders, the gear hub, of twelve inches outside diameter, serving as a fly wheel; the motor is of two and a half horse power and the maximum speed twenty-five miles an hour. A three-quarter-horse power oil motor tricycle is meant as tractor for a light two-seated two-wheeled chaise; the same parties showed phaetons and parcel vans. The Daimler Co., the first to enter England, showed a long line of vehicles with four-horse-power motors; one was a parcel van for the Cyclist publishers, and another was the Cyclist editor’s car on which he took his vacation journey of 2,000 miles to John-o-Groat’s and back to London. The review adds that the exhibit should convince of progress, for there was not a single English-built carriage in the collection, a year ago.