Coventry Motor Museum - by Matt Matthew

          Some members of the Science and Technology group visited the Coventry Motor Museum for their meeting in June. This is quite easy to get to by the X6 bus from St Margaret's bus station and the terminus in Coventry is right by the museum. The route goes by the M69, stopping on the way in Burbage. Unfortunately when our driver then rejoined the motorway, he chose the wrong direction and the only way to turn round was to drive all the way back to Leicester.

          With that delay we arrived at lunchtime and made that the first priority as the museum includes a café. The first exhibits in the museum do not in fact have motors as they are bicycles or their predecessors such as the velocipede, propelled by feet. In the earliest versions the rider pushed himself along with his feet on the ground, then pedals were added, first directly on the wheel, later acting by means of a chain, though some machines used treadles. Among the variants were tricycles, machines for two riders side by side, and tandems not just for two riders but as many as six. Frames evolved through many shapes before getting to the diamond design which is fairly standard today. That is not suited for women to ride wearing a skirt, one solution being a frame without a crossbar, the other solution being “rational dress” which came to be known as bloomers, after their inventor, a shocking innovation for some.

          For motorised transport too there was a variety of designs for the earliest horseless carriages before they converged on what we now recognise as a car. The examples that have survived tended to be expensive models built to impress and one can imagine them being driven by Toad of Toad Hall. They have mostly been beautifully restored, though that has not always been possible for canvas roofs or leather seats which have suffered from the passage of time. As the decades passed cheaper models were designed for the much wider class of drivers who could now afford them, the development of design being accelerated by the two world wars. After that, the cars on display included models that we remembered seeing on the roads in our youth, ranging from E-type Jaguars to the Hillman Imp.

          Perhaps the collection continues right up to the present day and may include electric cars (some early horseless carriages were electric but are not on display). There were too many galleries for us to survey them all. However, our tickets are all valid for a year so we have the opportunity to go back and see the rest.