CARS OF 1929

Shannon News, 27 November 1928, Page 3

CARS OF 1929

It goes without saying that front wheel drive will develop further. .Tho; great amount of interest displayed m existing models and the increasing number of manufacturers all over the world who have pinned their faith to the new type of drive form convincing proof that further experiments will be carried out and further ears of this description built. There have already been signs that, as far as Europe is concerned a still smaller type of machine will be built in the future, and that the market will not, rest alone w\fh the well-known 7 h.p. car which at the present moment possesses it. In France, Germany and in England, further developments of this kind are proceeding apace, and it is interesting to find that more than one firm is considering the of supercharging a' tiny engine, the better to obtain a reasonable performance for a sports model with strictly limited engiue capacity. Some years ago a supercharged 750 c.c. engine was installed in the chassis of a larger model to prove that the supercharger could be used with advantage in such fashion. As it happened, the engine would not then stand up to the additional load imposed, but all the data obtained promised success for the future, even though, such success might be confined in the main to the sports car market ami the cars produced in limited quantities. Such a model has been recently introduced.

Again, there is a very distinct tendency for chassis to lie mode lower, and " four or live prospective new models are almost as low built as the racing cars of a year ago. This development can bo overdone, of cour»e, for town work a low car may prove an inconvenience, and in one instance a design which lent itself particularly to the lowering scheme was fitted with a body purposely higher than it need have been, because it was thought that the very low car was too much of a freak, and that visibility in thick traffic might be impaired.