Benz

D, 1885 – 1926

(1) Benz & Co, Rheinische Gasmotorenfabrik, Mannheim, 1885 – 1899

(2) Benz & Cie, Rheinische Gasmotorenfabrik AG, Mannheim, 1899 – 1911

(3) Benz & Cie, Rheinische Automobil- und Motorenfabrik AG, Mannheim, 1911 – 1926

Karl Benz is honoured throughout the world as the man who designed and built the first workable motor car driven by an internal combustion engine. It is established that in 1885 his first Benz car was ready and made its first trials. Benz’s ideas were concentrated from the beginning on a car as an organic unit of chassis and engine, not on motorization of existing vehicles. The first Benz car was a three-wheeler with two driven rear wheels. The engine was a horizontal single-cylinder with a vertical crankshaft which had a horizontal flywheel. It developed ¾hp and a speed of 8mph is recorded for one of the first trial runs. This prototype Benz car had some featured which are still very extensively used in automobile construction: the water-cooled engine, electric ignition, mechanically operated inlet valve, and a differential gear. This first Benz car still exists and belongs to the Deutsches Museum, Munich, to which it was presented by its inventor. Several Benz Patentwagen replicas were built and are now in different museums.

Only a few Benz cars were produced and for sale in the following years. At the Munich Exhibition of 1888 Benz had the opportunity of showing his improved Benz car to a wider public. Instead of the wire wheels of the first Benz Patentwagen the later models had wooden-spoked wheels. Engine output was increased to 2hp. Sales of Benz’ stationary gas engines were quite satisfactory, while interest in Benz motor cars was very limited and it was not until 1890 that Benz started a real, if small, ‘to order’ production. This was partly a result of exhibiting his Benz car at the Paris World Fair in 1889 which led to increasing sales by his French agent Emile Roger, who already sold Benz stationary engines. The other important factor was that Benz was joined by two new partners in 1890. These two men who possibly saved Benz from the fate of numerous other inventors, driven aground by financial difficulties, were Friedrich von Fischer and Julius Ganss. Fischer took over internal administration and Ganss became responsible for sales. Benz himself was free for further developments on the technical side of the business, which made sound progress. 1893 saw the production of the first 4-wheeled Benz car, the Benz Victoria. This model was also the basis for the first Benz van and Benz bus in 1895; its technical conception was also adopted for the Benz Velo of 1894. This model has a place in the history of motoring as the world’s first production car. Production figures for 1885 to 1893 were 69 cars. 67 cars left the factory in 1894, mainly Benz Velos. These figures increased to 135 cars in 1895 and 181 in 1896.

In 1896 the first Benz Kontra-Motor appeared, an engine with two horizontally opposed cylinders. The first Benz lorry was produced in the same year. In 1898 pneumatic tyres were adopted for the Benz Comfortable. Production in 1899 was 572 cars, which brought Benz into the first rank of car producers. This number was surpassed in the following year with a production of 603 units. The first Benz racing car appeared in 1899 and was the start of numerus racing successes.

After 1901 sales of Benz cars declined as Benz stuck to his now outdated designs. Mercedes’ successes led him to evolve new concepts of construction; the result was the 2-cylinder front-engined Parsifal presented in 1903, available with cardan or chain drive and various engine outputs. In the same year a new 4-cylinder engine appeared and was used in all subsequent Benz models. A 1903 racing car developed 60hp and participated in the Paris-Madrid race. Karl Benz himself left the company in 1903 although he rejoined shortly afterwards. In 1906 he joined his sons in the firm of C. Benz Söhne.

1906 saw Benz gaining a second place in the Herkomer Trial while in the same event in 1907 a 5hp Benz finished first. Second and third place in the Coppa Florio, 1907, first place in the Florida 100-Miles Race, 1908, second and third place in the French Grand Prix, 1908, and second and fourth place in the American Grand Prix, 1908, led the world records which were set with 150hp and 200hp Benz cars by Bruce-Brown, Robertson, Oldfield and Hémery. With the 200hp Blitzen Benz Burman covered a mile in 25.4 seconds from a flying start at Daytona Beach in 1911. This was a speed of 140.8mph, but was not recognized internationally as a Land Speed Record.

In 1910 Benz acquired the Süddeutsche Automobil-Fabrik of Gaggenau. Production of private Benz cars in this factory was given up and in the following years Benz concentrated on commercial vehicles there.

A wide range of Benz cars for sale was marketed in the 1910-1914 period, ranging from the 2-litre Benz 8/20ps up to really big machines like the 10.1-litre Benz 39/100ps, all with side valve engines and shaft drive. However, the 22-litre Benz 200hp (which cost £1800 in England in 1912, and must have been the largest-engined private car to go on the market) had ohv and final drive by side chains. Benz were successful in the Austrian Alpine Trials, the Tatra-Adria Trial and various trials in Russia, to name only a few. The great promoter of German motoring, Prince Henry of Prussia, used only Benz cars.

The first Benz 6-cylinder car was produced in 1914 with the type Benz 25/65ps 6.5 litre. In 1918 the Benz 6/18ps 4-cylinder 1540cc appeared, a type developed during the war. A very important Benz development was the precombustion chamber diesel engine. It was first used in 1922 for Benz Sendling agricultural tractors, and the first diesel-engined lorry by Benz appeared in 1924. These were steps towards later Mercedes-Benz diesel-engined cars. Another idea introduced by Benz which also appeared in later Mercedes-Benz cars was the swing axle. It was one feature of the 2-litre 6-cylinder Benz ‘teardrop’ racing car designed on Rumpler principles. However, this car was not a great success either in its racing or in its sports version. In the Grand Prix of Italy in 1923 they gained fourth and fifth place. In 1924 Benz and Mercedes began to combine their interests, amalgamating in 1926.

Source: Georgano, encyclopedia of motorcar; HON

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Mors

France, 1895 – 1925; 1941 – 1943

(1) Société d’Electricité et d’Automobiles Mors, Paris, 1895 – 1907

(2) Société Nouvelle des Automobiles Mors, Paris, 1908 – 1943

Emile Mors was an electrical engineer, which may account for the ingenious ignition system (by low-tension coil and dynamo) found on his first Mors cars with aiv V4 engines, dry-sump lubrication, water-cooled heads and air-cooled barrels. These power units were rear-mounted, and the belt-and-pulley change-speed gear on the Mors car was in the Benz idiom. Production in 1898 was running at 200 Mors cars a year and front-mounted engines made their appearance on the Mors Petit Duc, an 850cc flat-twin with partial water cooling, cone clutch and final drive of the Mors car was by side chains. Steering was by handlebar and the Mors car cost £294 in England in 1900. The Mors car was still listed in 1901, though later examples were wheel-steered. 

The Mors racing cars designed by Brasier at first rivalled and then surpassed the hitherto invincible Panhards, winning the Paris-st. Malo and Paris-Bordeaux in 1899, following this with victories of Mors cars in the Paris-Toulouse-Paris and Bordeaux-Périgeux-Bordeaux in 1900, and the Paris-berlin and Paris-Bordeaux in 1901. In 1902 the Mors 60hp 9.2-litre competition machines had shock absorbers and in 1903 capacity of the Mors car had gone up to 11.6-litres, with mechanically-operated overhead inlet valves and streamlined bodywork of the upturned-boat type. Gabriel won the Paris-Madrid race on one of these Mors cars, while the Hon. C.S. Rolls recorded 84,68mph over the kilometer at Welbeck on a similar Mors car. The 1904 racers saw a reversion to T-head power units, but this was the last year in which Mors cars made any impression on the circuits. Though Jenatzy drove a Mors car for the team in the 1908 Grand Prix, he took 9th place, and the 2½-litre Mors cars prepared for the cancelled 1914 Coupe de l’Auto never reappeared.

Though full water cooling was not adopted till 1902 on Mors cars, vertical 4-cylinder engines made their appearance late in 1899, followed in 1900 by low-tension magneto ignition. 1901 Mors cars had what amounted to one carburetter per cylinder, with a huge central float chamber. From 1902 onwards the Mors cars followed conventional lines; 1903 Mors carmodels retained the chain drive, but had mechanically-operated sv in a T-head, pressed-steel frames, Dubrulle lubrications and Mercedes-style honey-comb radiators. Brasier had already departed the Mors car company to work for Georges Richard. In 1904 Charles Schmidt, also of Mors cars, went to design European-style cars for Packard in America – this had no connection with the American Mors cars made from 1906 to 1909. Also new on Mors cars in 1904 was the ‘shouldered’ radiator shell which persisted on the Mors carmarque almost to the end. 4-cylinder Mors cars only were made in 1905; they came in 2.3-litre, 3.2-litre, 4.3-litre, 5.7-litre and 8.1-litre sizes, and the largest Mors car, rated at 40/52hp, had an auxiliary transverse spring at the rear and cost £1.224. In 1906 the aluminium water jacketing introduced on Mors cars in 1903 was abandoned, while cone clutches gave way to the contracting-band type which Mors cars never departed from. Ignition was now by high-tension magneto and options included the Huillier windscreen (patented by a Mors car company’s director) and compressed-air starting. A cab-over-engine petrol brougham was listed on the 17hp Mors car chassis. In 1907 L-head monobloc engines arrived with the small 10hp Mors car and 15hp models, which Mors cars also had shaft drive and pressure lubrication: at the top of the range was an 50hp 6-cylinder Mors car with gate change and low-tension magneto ignition and this Mors car sold at £1.375 in England.

The 1908 depression was a blow from which the Mors car company never really recovered, though the company was reconstructed under André Citroën’s management and in 1909 they made 2.000 Mors cars, sales being aided by bigger shaft-driven 2.5-litre and 3.7-litre models. Chain drive and make-and-break ignition were to persiste on the biggest Mors cars until 1912, though there was a shaft-driven 3.6-litre 6-cylinder Mors car in 1911 and the L-head monobloc 12/15hp with 4-speed gearbox was quite popular in 1913/1914. Poppet and Knight sleeve-valve models in great diversity were offered on Mors cars during the last two pre-World War 1 seasons, the latter coming in 2.1-litre, 3.7-litre, 4.4-litre and 7.2-litre sizes with engines by Minerva. By 1914 only the small Mors cars retained sv power units; Citroën double helical bevels were standard, and an sv sports 17/20hp Mors cars was offered with electric lighting. Only Minerva-built Knight engines were used in Mors cars after 1918, the radiators wearing a triple-S monogram as a riposte to Panhard’s double-S (for sans soupages). Mors cars, however, had fewer resources than their former rivals, and not even good looks and a 70mph performance (plus front wheel brakes in 1921) could save the 3.6-litre Sporting 20 Mors car. A 2-litre Mors car, also Minerva-engined, appeared in 1922, but by 1925 most, if not all the Mors car company’s facilities had been absorbed by Citroën. There was a brief renaissance by Mors cars with electric cars during World War 2, but the last vehicles to bear the name of Mors were the Speed motor scooters made from 1952 to 1956.

Source: Georgano, encyclopedia of motorcar; MCS

The information is written with the greatest of care. However, if you have any suggested amendments please contact us at office@prewarcar.com