The london to Brighton is tomorrow so it is round to Rory’s to polish the car, which is a 1903 Humberette. As usual Rob and Rory were bickering over doing it earlier next year. Rob impressed us all by making a brass bolt to replace a missing one. We also discussed helping me make a panorama bracket for my camera.
It was soon polished and shiny.
The Humber is a British automobile that dates its beginning with Thomas Humber’s bicycle company founded in 1868. The first car was produced in 1898 and was a three-wheeled tricar with the first conventional four-wheeled car appearing in 1901. The Humber, like many other Marques, evolved from a company which had originally made pedal cycles.
The first cars had two- or four-cylinder engines, but the tiny single-cylinder-engined Humberette succeeded them. The name Humberette literally means ‘small Humber’. The Humber was a sturdy and well-made machine that carries a useful payload under very little power. A Humber would have been displayed as one of the many European cars presented at the Louisiana Exposition
held in St. Louis in 1904.
Under the Humberette’s hood is a 611 cc, 5 HP, automatic inlet, side exhaust valve 1-cylinder engine with a 92.1 x 92.1 mm bore and stroke. At a weight of 650 pounds, the Humberette can travel at a maximum speed of 25 mph. The rear driven vehicle uses a Longuemare float-type carburetor. The Humberette features a De Dion style of front-mounted water-cooled engine, with a leather-covered cone clutch, a two-speed gearbox controlled by levers under the steering wheel, as well as drive shaft to the rear wheels – the last being a real novelty in the early 1900s.