RUMCars Forum
General Category => Unusual Microcar Discussion => Topic started by: richard on April 16, 2013, 07:43:19 PM
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not unknown but what can we add to this pic ?
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Well at least it has doors which is more than can be said for The one I sold to Bruce Weiner.
BMA Hazelcar. I know we all immediately think electric but I think I remember reading somewhere that they also made some petrol ones? There was an article in RCN I believe.
Yes, the petrol ones came first with a Ford 8 engine.
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There's an excellent website
http://www.hazelcar.co.uk/index.htm (http://www.hazelcar.co.uk/index.htm)
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The transverse Ford version sounds really quite interesting. OK not a Microcar, but like many of these small cars that were more miniaturized big cars than a design up from manpower to the minimalist putter power of a small engine, in this case they realized that an underpowered unit was not going to work. Unfortunately we are not told why they did not sel,l save that possibly Ford refused to supply due to the Korean war. This was at a time when much was rationed, so it is possible. Taking this power issue on though, several MIcrocars should have been more successful had they offered a more powerful engine. Powerdrive/Coronet springs to mind. They are not bad to drive in all manners save they are underpowered and therefore unreliable. There are others, Jarc/Astra/Zeta, though here the Zeta gets closer to a result with the 3T unit.
Those smaller cars that did benefit from the extra investment of more engine tended to not be Microcars very long. Lloyds, NSU, even Goggo and BMW all found that small cars sold well if you got it right. The British market is really bereft of offerings other than the dear old Reliant who did devote some time to create a good engine, even if it was someone else's cast off. The larger manufacturers never really looked interested, going from A30/35 to MIni was not really miniaturizing. The Imp might be nearest flirtation, in fact. The bonus for us is it left the way open for the entrepreneur to try and fill the gap and we have some wonderfully eccentric British machines, who's biggest opposition were the great German offerings of the time, as a result.
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Well at least it has doors which is more than can be said for The one I sold to Bruce Weiner.
BMA Hazelcar. I know we all immediately think electric but I think I remember reading somewhere that they also made some petrol ones? There was an article in RCN I believe.
Yes, the petrol ones came first with a Ford 8 engine.
The Hazelcar information can be found in RCN 77 & 78
Jean
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Who's that good looking guy?
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yeah maybe and we know why he's smiling ;)
BUT THAT IS SOME DODGY LOOKING TRAILER ;)
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This is true, I had to borrow that trailer from Ken Bell, it wouldnt go on my three wheeler one.
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Fancy dropping Ken in it like that.
One day we will all look back on trailers we have used and wonder how we got away with as the tax comes due on the MOTed trailer padlocked to the garage wall. I always feel some much less depressed when spring finally appears, you know.
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Oh you have news on spring then do you. When is it expected ?
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Well it has arrived round here as I found the Collets holding it back in the road. The grass has grown but the trees are still not convinced.
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Severe hail and snow in essex I heard yesterday - so spring bouncing a bit
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Maybe our trees can see Essex. It certainly got chilly last night where I was stuck with a broken down van. Guess what, the new part bought to repair it has proved duff, fantastic! I would never have expected it! Fortunately being of stout frame and very annoyed I managed to bump start the van on the slight slope, return and collect the trailer taken off for the proceedure and get home. I swear that we are going to reverse engineer our way to death with all this rubbish that is being produced.
So the joy of finding a new shed yesterday was tempered with now fixing a fix, already done, with a quality part, that probably is not available, but for going to the scrap yard to find one on a 20 year old car! I must get my diesel powered 1957 Wolseley sorted out. The best of the old technology melded to the best of later technology before ECUs. Leather seats, disc brakes, turbo 1748cc on 5 speed. wood dash with matching proper dials, no plastic. Only gadget, a rather fetching extra light in the middle of the radiator grill to make people see you coming as they will think, 'Woz dat!' instead of bimbling on the 'phones, playing with knobs or generally doing anything other than driving correctly.
Then I will start collecting Bofors guns!