Posted by Peter Ceresole on November 30, 2007 at 17:44:07 from 80.176.146.133 user PeterC.
In Reply to: Re: posted by Owen Roberts on November 30, 2007 at 16:50:30:
We know from the Kelsalls (who were models for some of AR'S pictures), that AR owned a Trojan and a Bullnose Morris in the relevant writing period.
I have suggested before that Rattletrap might be a composite of these vehicles.
Yes, that seems pretty likely. But in the picture he drew of Rattletrap and the GA, it has a rather distinctively soft Bullnose look to it.
Diverted (as can happen) onto the Trojan museum web site, I saw a cutaway of a later Trojan car, from the '30s. Ye gods. The blood runs cold; with all the mechanical weight overhanging the rear axle and with the banana-peel characteristics of the tyres of the time, it must have handled like a windscreen wiper. I doubt that, on a damp day, it could have made it once round the lakeside road at Windermere. And an utter nightmare to maintain (look at those inboard drum brakes). Definitely not a car to put into the hands of Billy Lewthwaite, let alone Molly Blackett. But it was an unsuccessful model. So that was all right then...
