THE AUTO-CAR IN AUSTRALIA.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 5777, 22 January 1897, Page 3

THE AUTO-CAR IN AUSTRALIA.

9 - Events are in train for the establishment of an auto-car factory in Melbourne or Sydney, and a gentleman representing the Austral Cycle and Motor Company of London is busy booking orders for the Pennington motor in its various forms. This motor is applied to all forms of vehicle — the four-seated tricycle, all the varieties of bicycle and tricycle, the whole gamut of fashionable carriages, the omnibus, the parcel delivery van, the steam launch or the steamer, the traction engine, or the stationary engine. It varies, of course, in weight, but the cost, which is set down at ld per h.p. per hour, remains the same, and the machinery is equally simple. When it is stated that the weight of the engine suited for road vehicles is only 22-Jlb, that in this light form it develops 2 h.-p., and will run a car with a load of four persons at the rate of thirty-two miles an hour under favourable circumstances, the possibilities of the Pennington car may be imagined. It can be driven by either petroleum, kerosene or paraffin. The motor-car, it is asserted, will not only supersede cabs, omnibuses and other city conveyances, but it will take the place of camels in the arid parts of Australia. Great expectations have been formed of the new motor in West Australia, from which colony the company has already received orders which, if its factory were in working order to-morrow, would keep the machinery fully employed for the next eighteen months. The favourite design for the West Australian trade is a light tricycle, which is capable of carrying great weights and of maintaining a high rate of speed over the roughest roads. Such a machine, it is said, would come triumphantly through trials to wliich even camels would succumb. A large shipment of cars is expected to reach Australia at the end of this month, to satisfy the demand until the factory is in working order. " The decay of the Australian horse " used to be a favourite subject of discussion in Melbourne papers ; but when the auto-car gets in its work the question will be removed from the region of debate. This may not be greatly regretted, for the apotheosis Of " that noble animal the horse " has become rather tiresome, and it will be a relief to hear some talk of motor-car races which may add a new attraction to Cup day at Flemington by reviving the excitement that used to attend chariot racing in ancient Greece and Rome.