Panhard was another manufacturer that was at the very beginning of the automotive industry and were based in France, in fact as you will see, they were associated with many of the leading French brands of the century. Rene Panhard, the son of a saddler and coach-builder, and his associate Emile Levassor founded their company in 1887. They had both worked at a wood-working … [Read more...]
Update on the Sale of Opel to the PSA Group
About a year ago General Motors sold its European business of Opel and Vauxhall to the PSA Group who own the Peugeot and Citroen marques. It was an interesting deal because Peugeot and Citroen have had their financial difficulties in the recent past and the GM Europe business has had 16 years of losses and only managed to take 6% of the European market. For General Motors it … [Read more...]
Hydro Pneumatic Suspension
Hydro pneumatic suspensions have been available on cars for over 50 years. The concept was to provide a much smoother ride than was available from other forms of suspension. It was an engineer at Citroen in France who developed the original version back in the mid to late 1940s and it hit the showrooms on the Traction Avant model in 1954. The car was unique in its day having … [Read more...]
Power Steering
This week’s technical article is about power steering. The concept is simple: help the driver steer the car with the minimal of fuss. The implementation is a little trickier. The key to good power steering is the weight of the steering – too soft and you risk having very light steering and possibly a lack of feel – too heavy and it defeats the purpose of having the powered … [Read more...]
Hillman
William Hillman was first known as a designer of the velocipede, a forerunner to the bicycle and he had been involved with a group of entrepreneurs who were importing them from France. He was born in 1849 and worked for the Coventry Machinist Company, a company that made small machines. In the mid 19th century, Coventry in England was the centre for sewing machine … [Read more...]