When the oil crisis emerged in 1975, Dr. David Hon realized that better urban mobility was needed. Inspired by his days at UCLA, when he had to disassemble his bike to fit in his car, he began designing a portable bike that was light, good-looking, and quickly foldable.
Created as a light delivery vehicle for tight spaces, the Midget was originally introduced in 1957 as a three-wheeled truck and enjoyed huge popularity among small businesses and delivery services all over Asia. This version, the Midget II, debuted in 1996 to meet modern standards for the same design ideals.
In 1949, the British Army approached Daimler (the British car company, not Daimler-Benz AG of Germany) to replace its Dingo Scout Car, a previous Daimler product. The Ferret Scout Car, introduced in 1951, improved upon the Dingo’s design with an optional manually-rotating turret, housing a machine gun.
In the early 1920’s, Gaston Daix, a highly-skilled piano maker with a factory in Pessac, near Bordeaux in the south of France, made this unusual ark-like pedal car with a craftsmanship that embodies the timelessness of an elegant musical instrument.
The Indy Racing League, better known as IRL, is the sanctioning body of a predominantly oval based open-wheel racing series in the United States and Japan. Founded in 1994 by Tony George, one of the IRL’s most popular race is the Indianapolis 500.
This car was built by David Austin to compete in S.C.C.A. hillclimbs and autocrosses. The concept of the car began with acquisition of a good motor from a wrecked motorcycle.
Charismatic used cars salesman Glen Gordon “Gary” Davis moved from Indiana to Southern California filled with optimism and dreams. On the streets of Los Angeles, he saw an aerospace-styled three-wheeled vehicle called the “Californian” and was struck by its uniqueness.
Glenn Gordan “Gary” Davis was an industrial designer and salesman. Around the end of World War II, he bought a small racecar that a California racing enthusiast had converted to a 3-wheeler–thinking it would make a practical economy car.
Derny is a term that has become synonymous with small pacing vehicles for bicycle racing, but the company itself was more than just jargon. Born out of a French craze for motorized bicycles during the 1930s, Derny debuted its first model, the “Entraineur” in 1938, to pace the Bordeaux-Paris race.
Derny began production in 1949, specializing in the manufacture of auxiliary-engined bicycles and tandems, all powered by proprietary engines. The Derny Taon, or “Horse fly” was unveiled at the 1955 Paris Motorcycle Show.
Although DB racecars achieved unequaled small engine success, their accomplishments have largely been forgotten over time. To honor the DB marque, Mark Brinker and his team prepared a DB model HBR-5 to race at the Bonneville salt flats.
René Bonnet was a self-made engineer with a passion for competition and Charles Deutsch was a trained body designer who managed a custom coach works in Champigny-sur-Marne, close to Paris.They started as Deutsch-Bonnet, shortened to DB in 1947.
After having great success in GT and sports car racing, two of the great race car builders in France, Charles Deutsch and Rene Bonnet, developed the Monomill series of racing in 1954.