1900 Darracq 6.5hp Four seater Voiturette

1900 Darracq 6.5hp Four seater Voiturette

French engineer and entrepreneur Alexandre Darracq established the Gladiator Cycle Co. in 1891, developed it over a five year period and sold out in 1896. He retained his interests in the bicycle industry, shrewdly moving to components manufacture, but was intrigued by the new-fangled horseless carriages. The first successful car built by Société A. Darracq at Suresnes was a horizontal-engined car to the design of Leon Bollée which appeared in 1898. Darracq found this machine to be inefficient and built a car to his own design which appeared in 1900. This was powered by a vertically mounted single cylinder Perfecta engine of 6½hp, sitting in a tubular steel chassis, driving through a three speed gearbox and with shaft final drive, a very advanced feature in its day. The model was first advertised in Autocar magazine in November 1900 priced at £250 and some 1,200 or so examples of this model left the Suresnes factory in the period up to the end of 1901. The new Darracq caused much consternation in the De Dion Bouton camp and there is no doubt that Darracq were a thorn in the side to that expanding company.

This jewel-like voiturette is the oldest Darracq dated by The Veteran Car Club of Great Britain and is recorded in their current List of Cars. It carries four seater coachwork by Carrosserie A.Vedrine.E.Beugniot & Co. of 7 Quai de Seine, Courbevoie, a favoured coachbuilder local to the Darracq factory at Suresnes. Car no. 50 was imported in 1900 via The Automobile Manufacturing Co.Ltd. of 48 and 49 Long Acre, London, WC, and first registered BW 33 with Oxford County Council. That number was lost during a long period off the road and the present similar Oxford number was allocated in the 1960s.

Descriptions & pictures by bonhams & flickr