1908 Holsman Motor Carriage with rope drive

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akbornheathen@reddit

Is it that weird? Ever seen how a riding lawnmower works? It’s a belt that you tighten or loosen.

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1908? That must be a lot earlier than that. I've got a 1903 Peugeot Bebe' that looks way more advanced then that. My guess is that is a 1900 to maybe 1902 car max, the build must have started before 1900

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Duesey@reddit

High Wheelers like this were seen as less expensive but reliable horseless transportation well into the teens. Despite the fact it looks like a carriage without a horse (derr, which it is), the design was very effective on rural, rutted, and uneven roads. The solid rubber tires were also a lot cheaper than pneumatic tires.

And not to be a dick, but the Bébé came out in 1905 as the Type 69 but is usually used to refer to the Ettore Bugatti designed Type BP1 that came out in 1913.

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MagicTriton@reddit

The Bebé came out in 1901

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Duesey@reddit

Bébé is a nickname. To which Type are you referring? There were obviously Peugeots built in 1901, but never have I heard them referred to with the moniker Bébé.

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MagicTriton@reddit

The Bebé was introduced with the 650cc engine in 1901, the simple fact that I got in stock a very well documented, dated by the VSCC Peugeot Bebé, plus the fact that there another 2 Peugeot Bebé that go around the London to Brighton and are dated by the VSCC too, should be enough to prove that even if I didn’t know what I’m talking about, someone else did their due diligence and studied them things too to bottom and made sure all the facts are correct on them

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Duesey@reddit

So that would be a Type 36. I've just never heard of them referred to as Bébés. #themoreyouknow🌈

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WhoTheHeckKnowsWhy@reddit

1908? That must be a lot earlier than that. I've got a 1903 Peugeot Bebe' that looks way more advanced then that. My guess is that is a 1900 to maybe 1902 car max, the build must have started before 1900

my guess was some company was doing conversion mods on old horse buggies. Waste not want not.

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MagicTriton@reddit

Well those are not cars, those are horseless carriages, the term car/automobile came a bit later in the years

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WhoTheHeckKnowsWhy@reddit

I agree and the tile now says "motor carriage'

And to be fair given that horse carriages were a big thing until the 1950s in much of the first world, why not convert them into low hp put-puts?

Sticking a lawnmower engine on to make unpowered things move is still something 3rd world shed gnomes and youtubers commonly do now.

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WhoTheHeckKnowsWhy@reddit

given that horse carriages were a big thing until the 1950s in much of the first world world. why not convert them into low hp put puts to use.

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ERTHLNG@reddit

They dont just build 2026 top of tbe line cars. In some country's you can get new cars built like the 90s of earlier. They make all kinds of cheap stuff simple and reliable or sometimes junk.

This was an old car I think to be affordable to more people to own as a toy. Like a 1908 version of an entry level sports bike or a ultralight aircraft kit build.

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MagicTriton@reddit

Sorry but that's a completely different story.

In that era cars were a new thing, all of it was new, there wasn't really a concept of expensive or cheap cars, they were all expensive and the engineering was doing massive steps month after month.

The engineering design was changing quite quickly and every automobile maker was following the most recent updates while adding their own "improvement". The design in video is "incredibly" old for 1908, and as the other user commented, the holsman went out of production because they were keeping a very old design as they're own product

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SalTez@reddit

From Wikipedia:

The Holsman was a very simple design - unfortunately this resulted in the company's demise. Unlike other companies, who added pneumatic-tired standard models, Holsman stuck faithfully to highwheeler production only until the company folded in 1910.

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MagicTriton@reddit

hat explains it, it is a very old design that, not the engine, those were the pioneering times of engineering, but the overall design of the vehicle, very very outdated for the era.

2 or 3 years don't sound like much nowadays, but when those things were just coming out the improvements they had months apart from each other were absolutely impressive

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dellh82@reddit

Rope drive is WILD

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FortheloveofRC@reddit

Did anyone else notice that thing as he drove away?

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RedIcarus1@reddit

I used to own a red one. I loved that car!

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Hatedpriest@reddit

Love the VW Thing.

There's a powder blue and white one by me the owner takes immaculate care of. Fucking awesome!

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Independent_Wrap_321@reddit

You mean the Thing. lol

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Baron_Ultimax@reddit

You there, fill it up with petroleum distillate

and re-vulcanize my tires, post haste.

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SjalabaisWoWS@reddit

Imagine how fast this one will feel even at only bicycle speed. The thin wheels, high and exposed sitting position...quite awesome.

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Fit_Sink_4572@reddit

Better than Nissan's cvt...

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GiftedGeordie@reddit

Looking at things like this, I can see where people back in the past were coming from when they said "This car thing will never catch on".

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A_Literal_6_Year_Old@reddit

Also very clear to see why they were originally called horseless carriages

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airfryerfuntime@reddit

People also just didn't really understand cars. The streets were where people walked and kids played. With horses, it wasn't really that big of a deal, just move out of the way, but when the cars came, they were everywhere, seemingly overnight, and people still just didn't understand that they couldn't keep blindly waking in the streets. This is also where the term 'jay walking' came from.

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DeekFTW@reddit

This is also where the term 'jay walking' came from.

Can you elaborate on this? I'm not seeing a connection.

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ILikeWoodAnMetal@reddit

There were many accidents happening with early automobiles endangering and killing pedestrians. So many that automobiles were at risk of getting banned. The car manufacturers prevented that by shifting the blame from the car to the pedestrians, it was their fault they got run over, not the car. Early stories were absolutely infuriating

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airfryerfuntime@reddit

People didn't really know how to behave around cars, so they'd just sort of walk out in into the street. 'Jay' was an old term for an idiot, a country bumkin. Police and the auto industry used the term 'jay walking' to shame people into using crosswalks. "Don't be a Jay, use a crossing".

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DeekFTW@reddit

That's hilarious, thanks for the insights!

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oneposttown@reddit

Yeah same. It's quite loud, only as fast as a brisk walk, probably breaks down a lot (from what I can see in the video), and I've got to pay for it and the fuel. Nah I'm good.

I guess we do that with a lot of new, nascent tech. It's only when the pros outweigh the cons that most people consider adoption.

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ailyara@reddit

also the streets it had to run on were no where near that smooth

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michal_hanu_la@reddit

That's rather clever.

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birgor@reddit

This type of "clutch" is common on lawnmower tractors and small two wheel tractors. But with a rubber and fabric belt.

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umbraundecim@reddit

Rubber belts are used on many atvs as well, its a very common tranmission type for small applications for sure.

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birgor@reddit

ATV's usually have CVT, a related but much more advanced technology that actually changes the ratio of the transmission, I guess this is what you are thinking about? A belt clutch would be a very cheap and insufficient solution on an ATV, except maybe a small one for kids.

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In August 1888, Bertha Benz, wife of Karl Benz, undertook the first long-distance journey in a Benz Patent-Motorwagen No. 3, driving roughly 106 km (66 miles) one-way from Mannheim to Pforzheim, Germany, without her husband's knowledge.

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