De Dion Bouton Tricycle. Circa 1902.

Lot 27
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Estimation :
50000 - 60000 EUR
Result with fees
Result : 60 000EUR
De Dion Bouton Tricycle. Circa 1902.
Engine n°16274 Clutch Water cooling of the cylinder head To be registered We are at the end of 1881, to prepare the party he is organizing, Albert De Dion goes to the Giroux shop, boulevard des Italiens in Paris. While choosing toys and cotillions, he stopped in front of a small steam engine in the window and asked to know its creators. This is how he met the mechanic Georges Bouton, born in 1847, and Charles Trépardoux, born in 1853, an engineer from Arts & Métiers. The De Dion Bouton journey could begin. In 1882, both of them put themselves at the exclusive service of Albert de Dion. The first Trépardoux et Cie company was founded and lasted until 1887, when it became the De Dion, Bouton & Trépardoux company. In the early 1890s, at a time when motorised road transport was developing rapidly and it was unclear whether steam, electricity or the internal combustion engine would take over, De Dion and Bouton turned to the interne combustion engine, much to the dismay of Trépardoux who resigned in 1894, leaving his former partners who will develop what would become the first high-speed internal combustion engine. The company De Dion et Bouton was born, and became De Dion, Bouton et Cie in 1898 The cylinder head is cooled by water using the radiator located under the water tank. Another specificity of our tri-cycle is the clutch located on the right side of the engine. It will be very useful to participate to the London Brighton The engines of the genius Bouton developed powers far superior to those of the Daimler and Benz engines, while matching them in reliability. It is therefore not surprising that these engines were adopted by hundreds of car manufacturers, led by Louis Renault and Louis Delage, influenced by the success of the De Dion-Bouton tricycles in events like Paris-Bordeaux. The first engine was a single cylinder, half horsepower, air-cooled and tested on a tricycle in 1895. Very quickly, it evolved to 2 ¾ horsepower and was water-cooled, like our example. From 1895 until the early years of the 20th century, the De Dion Bouton engine was adopted by more than 300 mobile car manufacturers who successfully equipped their first vehicles with it. Acquired from a garage in Charente Maritime, our tricycle has been in the same collection for several decades. It has benefited from an old and brilliant restoration, with the conservation of all its original elements. It has recently been restarted and is awaiting its next owner for a subtle tune-up. There has been a real craze for tricycles and quadricycles in recent years. The Teuf Teuf club in France and its English equivalent the De Dion Bouton Club U.K. are extremely dynamic and offer many attractive events open exclusively to De Dion Bouton drivers and riders. The Holy Grail being to participate in the London Brighton or the famous Brooklands tricycle race.
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