Dear Friends

One of the contributors I've met on this forum, and who has since become a valued friend, sent me some CD's for Christmas. One of which contains scans of a great many Bugatti related articles, one being written by Griffith Borgeson which appeared in Thoroughbred & Classic Cars in 1979, titled "The dawn of the light alloy wheel." This past weekend I made the mistake of actually reading it, and as I sit idle here at work, it's still bugging the hell out of me.

Ettore Bugatti stole (there is no other word for his actions) the design for the T35's wheels from a 1920 design patent of Harry Miller. And then fraudulently submitted a French patent for this same design under his own name. I had always hoped that Mr Borgeson would turn out to be as enviously vindictive about Ettore Bugatti as Brock Yates was, and still is, about Enzo Ferrari. No such luck I'm afraid, I have yet to read a more balanced and lucid argument which so completely annihilates the false reputation a deeply flawed man like Ettore Bugatti succeeded in gaining for himself.

Griffith Borgeson examines in great detail the claims about its function Ettore used to justify the submitting of this patent, and managed to successfully expose them as lies. Quoting, amongst many others, the Great Hugh Conway I understood immediately that the design cannot in any way assist the cooling of either the brakes or the tires, and yet this exactly how Ettore tried to justify his cowardly immoral act of fraud. And, just to cap it all, the original design for the T35 wheel was an unmitigated disaster, only rectified by Ivan Dutton during the seventies, I believe. I've never really noticed just how many spare wheels, with tyres fitted, Ettore brought to that first race at Lyon, and yet he still ran out of tyres. He then tried to (successfully, it would seem) blame Dunlop for this fiasco.

Griffith quotes another author, I forget whom, describing the Bugatti Type 35 as a "first class, second rate race car." Roland Bugatti himself described those wheels as "de la merde." Old Ettore must have been even more of a salesman than I thought.

I wish to ask you two questions :

1) When my copy of Borgeson's "Bugatti : The dynamics of mythology" arrives, how much less will I think of Ettore Bugatti then?

2) Even knowing that he had feet of clay, why do I still love and admire this man, and his (His? Ha!) cars so much?

Debate please.

Kind Regards
Johan Buchner

Dear Johan,
I met Borgeson a couple of times and I know he was a man on a mission to counteract any myth building around Ettore. His "The dynamics of mythology' however creates more myths than many other books. I am particularly suspicious when he quotes Roland about the alloy wheels: 'those wheels were absolute junk'. Although no doubt there must have been some problems with casting errors in the beginning I do not believe the situation was that bad. How many Bugatti DNF's in races have been recorded due to wheel failure?
Even if Miller might have filed a patent for something similar to the Bugatti GP wheel there is no proof such a wheel was ever produced. At least Ettore made a commercial success of his patent which also unlike the Miller patent included the integral brake drum.
I am convinced that your admiration for Ettore will not suffer too much provided you read the very interesting Borgeson book with the necessary scepticism.
Regards, Bugwrench

the original design for the T35 wheel was an unmitigated disaster, only rectified by Ivan Dutton during the seventies, I believe

Can you give some more information on this point?

Am about to Google away and find the book you refer to now. Sounds interesting.

SB

I did not realise that Ettore's design, unlike the Miller one, incorporated the brake-drum as an integral component - that does shine a different light on it, at least for me.

You make a good point Bugwrench, not many T35 DNF'd due to the wheels failing, and yes, Griffith did make a bit of a meal of the teething problems didn't he? I took a lot of comfort from your reply; Ettore Bugatti may have had his failings, but he did achieve more than most. And nothing will ever make me love his cars any less. You restored my balance - Thank you.

Stuart let me know if you'd like me to send you a scan of the article, it makes for some thought-provoking reading.

Regards
johan

Yes please!

Regards


SB

I am sure L J K Setright did an article on the wheel for Supercar Classics, but although I own most copies of that magazine, I do not have it. Perhaps it was Car?

Any ideas from anyone?

Kind Regards


SB

Especcially in those days, patents were ideas that were put to paper, and registered.
Today, at least in Europe, a commission judges the idea for being new technology, and new ideas. It also check wheter a similar patent is already filed. Lot of requests for a patent are declined.

What makes Ettore Bugatti different from others, is that he filed a huge amount of patents, and made a lot of them work. He created prototypes, and production series of a lot of patents.

Putting something to paper is one. making it actually work is second...

I am sure Jaap will jump in, as he is preparing a book about Bugatti patents. (save some money, Johan!)

_________________
Vive la Marque !!

I think Bugatti by Borgeson is quite an interesting read. Not to miss in your Bugatti library as he is the first of the authors not to only praise Ettore but to keep being critical and down to earth. And: he knows how to write a book.
Anyway, I think Bugwrench is more than right. In both Borgesons Bugatti and Miller books I cannot find any evidence that the wheels are more than just similar. Plus: Bugatti actually made and used them and did in this case not only list a patent.
Johan: I'm interested in the artice (or is it a preview of the chapter in his book?).
Stuart: you can find the article by LJK Setright in Supercar Classics, feb. 1990.

regards,
Patrick

Before I embarked on my project to try to build a car that could behave as the ones Ettore' built, I tried to learn all I could about the man and his machines.

Flawed! Wow, what an understatement! He certainly was flawed. The thing that saves him is that we are all flawed...well, all except me. A couple years in prison, never finished the eighth grade, unsuccessful marriage, and bankrupt once but that doesn't mean I am flawed...right? It must be the system that labels us that would accuse me of being flawed.

Well, it appears Ettore' had issues. I think we have all, at one time or another, had a boss like that. You know the type. All good ideas were his - all bad ideas are yours. From what I can tell, he was one of those social climbers that wished more than anything to hobnob with the big shots of the day. I think that was the motivation behind the Type 41. I doubt he cared if he ever made any money building them as long as he could claim that he built a huge gawdy car for a huge gawdy king or queen. That way, his son could get to play "hide the salami" with the princess and guarantee that the name "Bugatti" would be forever associated with royality.

That is not to say that the man didn't have some notable accomplishments - he did. There is no such thing as pure invention. We all have to begin somewhere. Sure, Bugatti used some knowledge gained elsewhere. The two Miller race cars he bartered for and essentially copied the head design is but one example. There are many others. If one digs through the past of most industrial giants, the closets are full of skeletons. Henry Ford certainly had his.

In my attempt to build my own "replica" of a type-35, I can see that what he did was no easy task. He knew what he was doing. Considering the time and what he had to work with, he acomplished a lot in the design of that car.

You know William, you do have a point; Ettore was by no means perfect, but who amongst us are? Sure as hell not me. But I am curious as to how this man gained such acclaim, both during his own life-time and posthumously.

But he's got me curious. Yes, I am looking forward to receiving the Borgeson book. By the way, Conway makes the point that Ettore realised that it was the cylinder-head, and not the supercharger, which Ettore recognised as a great piece of design. If you are going to be "influenced" by others, it might as well be by the best. Remarkable man, Harry Miller.

Patrick, I've tried to send the scan to Stuart, but it is too big for e-mail. Stuart sent me some sort of JPEG compressor, and as soon as I have found someone who can explain to me how the damn thing work, I will send the scan. But first my vocabulary will expand some.

Computers make me feel stupid.

Regards
Johan Buchner

Johan, I have spent a considerable amount of time researching the man - far more than should be warrented but facinating nonetheless. He was quite a character.

As I have become older - older than I ever thought I would get to be - I have discovered that it is necessary to overlook many of the failings of others in order to learn from them and enjoy them. Some of the most interesting people I have ever met have some of the worst flaws of all.

From what I can gather, Bugatti had about ten really good years. Seems, from my perspective, his "hayday" ended after about 1930. At least any technological advantage he had apparently was overtaken by then. Competing against the mighty German and Italian race car factories was out of the question, for example.

I think he also suffered from what I would call technological dementia - a reluctance or inability to grasp new technology as we get older. I know a wonderful German man who is as good of a mechanic as ever lived. He absolutely refuses to touch a computer. I offered to give him one, set it up, and teach him to use it at no cost. He just won't do it. He can't come to grips with the fact that sourcing hard to find parts can not be done any other way now. I think Ettore' faced the same problem. The mechanical brakes, the solid front axel, the 100mm stroke on practically all his engines, and numerous other technological achievements just passed him by. I also think he got to his intellectual limit in the twenties. I doubt he could have attracted and kept other men who had were independent thinkers. I think he would have "rubbed them the wrong way". Seems to me, he came by his nickname, "the boss" honestly. A case in point is the four wheel drive car: I don't think Ettore' understood how constant velocity joints worked and anybody who did understand them would threaten Bugatti and be shunned aside.

I think the current high value Bugatti's enjoy is not so much because of their technological superiority but rather by their shear beauty, style, and the fact that they were all, to one degree or another, one of a kind.

Most of us find our most interesting cars to be the ones that we couldn't afford when we were kids. Here in the USA, a Pontiac GTO was coveted by millions of young men in the 1960's because it had a big engine. Other cars with big engines that were technological dinosaurs then are sold at auctions today for huge sums of money. The Bugatti is different. It has a timelessness about it. The T-35, for example, was a work of art then and is still absolutely beautiful today. Some of the T-57's have nothing else to compare them to then or now.

As to Bugattis genius ending in the 30s, that is absolutely not true. It is just, that his interest shifted away from automobiles, towards other modes of transport. Trains of course, with the autorail and later the steam train. Aviation, with the development of the 100P airplane and Boats, with a variety of constructions, the Niniette VI which was a Bugatti design (both the hull as well as the novel propulsion system, the torpedo boat and his own sailing yacht). Enough to do, and a lot of novel ideas indeed!

That he still could manage automobiles and engines can be seen in the war years, with the design and development of the T68, T72 and T73.

Why his attention shifted away from automobiles can be only guessed, in my opinion the automobiles had come to a grade of perfection where a car could not be just designed on the drawing board and built, as it seems was done with many of the pre 1930s cars. After the initial design, more development was needed to get a design right. It seems to me that Ettore was not the man to have the patience for that, but thats only my guess.

I dont think he suffered from technological dementia - he just didnt like to use inventions that were not his own, it seems. Later on there seems to have become a sense of what a Bugatti ought to be, in his own eyes.

One thing that I havent found an answer to, and puzzles me is why there was no successor to the T40 developed, a twin-cam 4-cylinder. Especially in the late 30s such a car might just have kept the automobile factory in business. Remember that in those days less cars left the factory each year, than today!

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J.J., you certainly bring up some good points. Perhaps I will add to my learning about this complicated man.

Having said that, I should clarify my use of the phrase "technological dementia". Seems to me that Bugatti had a wealth of "street smarts". He could look at a frame design and see if it would work or not. Looking at the frame design for the T-35, for instance, it is easy to see what he did. It simply isn't that complicated. No knowlege of mathematics is required and I doubt any was used to design it. I think he had some 4mm steel laying around and they simply beat it into a shape that looked like the drawings and tried it.

Mechanical and automotive engineering degrees are not easy to earn. There is a lot of knowledge to be learned. In order to work out the design of a frame, for example where the stresses can be calculated and failures can be predicted was beyond the scope of anything Ettore' ever learned. It is my observation that the way he did it was, if it looked right, it was right and anybody who disagreed was fired.

I have been thinking about this topic as I work on my replica project. Seems the days of "larger than life" individules getting to lofty positions of power and influence are coming to an end and being replaced with brain trusts".

Just in my lifetime, I have seen an erosion of individule control over things like automobile building or even customizing of existing vehicles. Young men, for instance, used to do some radical customizing such as chopping the roof off and lowering it, making a street rod out of a 1920's model T, or some other similar endeavour. Now they simply buy some plastic stuff that is labeled, "no tools required" and stick it on their Japanese "rice rocket".

There are some radical types still left to be sure. Here in the USA, there is a guy by the name of Burt Rutan. His designs of aircraft are nothing short of breathtaking. There are not many of them left, however. Several years ago, I built a single seat automobile. Hardly anybody who has seen it believes I built it myself - that I actually built the frame, made my own casting patterns, and made the body using foam and carbon fiber. It isn't rocket science! Anybody could do it. Ettore' Bugatti was one of those guys who did do it. He did it many times. Like all of us who have ever built many things ourselves, he had some failures. So what. At least we now know what doesn't work.

From what I can learn, there are about 7000 cars that came out of his little factory in Molsheim. Anything they lacked in technoligical superiority, they gained in shear beauty. As I work on my replica T-35 built as close to scale as I possibly can, I am in awe of the beauty of it. Not my workmanship but the design. I can see why it caused such a sensation when it first appeared on the scene in the mid 1920's. A "brain trust" never would have taken so many chances at once. It never would have happened.

William the more I read your views, the more I realise just how much we are in agreement about certain things ; none more so than trying to understand Le Patron. You are right, he just went ahead and did things his way, his creations are absolutely unique, only he could have done them. And the more I learn about this man , the more he intrigues me, it's what I call the "Gullwing Syndrome." The 57 - 63 Roadster is a better, more rounded product, but that rear suspension of the preceding 300SL Gullwing , due to it being slightly less than perfect , made it legendary. Its the flaws that makes it so.

Ettore was a genius, a visionary, a dreamer and a fool. We will never see his likes again. He will also never bore me ; which is why I have decided to bite the bullet and order the Steinhauser book - 3 Volumes on just Ettore's first 40 years, yes, I shall gain even more insight into a man whose life and times utterly fascinate me.

You built a single seater? By yourself? No wonder you're building a Type 35 ; I understand perfectly why you are doing this you know - it is because you can. Damn William , I envy you this journey your talent allow you to walk. Mickey Thompson (is the spelling right?) had that same uniqueness of purpose , which I think might be the reason America fascinate me so much more than either Canada or Mexico - Americans are just that bit more alive. And with Anti-Semitism becoming ever more popular in Europe, America stands alone in protecting Israel from the forces of darkness which poses such a grave danger to all of Western Civilisation. (I make no apologies for my admiration for the Jews, and no apologies for my contempt for the muslims - they kill homosexuals, and they kill freedom)Yes indeed, there is a lot to admire about America, even though Ralph Lauren is American, and Paul Russell, and Arturo Keller, and.... let me stop right there.

You also write well, which reminds me, I got the Du Gan T43 book yesterday, but I shall post about that one a little later.

To conclude; I keep changing my mind about Ettore; the one minute I believe him to be the Creator of Molsheim, the next the Fool of Mullhouse. But he never ever bores me, and yes, he created 7 - 8000 cars, each one of them a masterpiece. Not a bad legacy at all.

Regards
Johan