Cartercar

The Cartercar was an American automobile manufactured from 1906 to 1916 in Detroit Michigan.

A fairly successful maker of friction-drive cars, the company began with a flat-twin engine; this was used alongside vertical fours in the 1909 range of cars. The company merged with the makers of the Pontiac High Wheeler in 1908, becoming part of General Motors in 1909. Two models, both pair-cast fours, appeared in 1912; the Model R was 4160 cc, while the Model S was 5437 cc. Each had a single chain drive. Tragedy struck when Byron Carter, the company head, was killed while trying to start a stalled car; the crank kicked back and hit him in the jaw, causing gangrene which ultimately proved fatal. With Carter's death, the company folded.Carter was a personal friend of Cadillac founder Henry Leland, and his unfortunate death prompted development of the Self-Starter (introduced in 1912), the first successful motor vehicle electric starting system, eliminating the dangerous crank.

Because its friction-drive transmission allowed selection of any ratio rather than having fixed gear positions, the Cartercar was advertised as "The Car of a Thousand Speeds."

References

*David Burgess Wise, "The New Illustrated Encyclopedia of Automobiles".
* [http://www.cartercar.net/ Website for Cartercar enthusiasts]