By Pete Vack and David Beare
From the Archives: It is fitting that exactly five years ago we published this interesting bio about David Beare just as his latest book, The Simca Story, 51 years of cars 1933-1984, is now in print and available. This great little history of Simca will be reviewed shortly.-Ed.
First the name; we have to explain the name for those of us unfamiliar with British jargon. “The name Stinkwheel derives from 1930’s slang amongst motorcyclists for small-capacity, feeble two-stoke powered cyclemotors and autocycles which buzzed noisily but slowly around in a cloud of blue oily smoke- a stinkwheel,” writes Beare. His first two books were histories of such cyclemotors- “The Stinkwheel Sagas.” Thus came the name of the publishing company, which is at the very least, unforgettable. How Stinkwheel went from cyclemotors to Hispano Suiza is another good question. [Read more…] about Fiats, Panhards, Pegaso, now Simca: The Stinkwheel Story