Topic: Fuldamobil and its Variants

[JonathanPoll]

Hello all,

  First of all, I have to say I have never really written any articles before, and I'm only 15 years old, so don't expect too much!

I am a microcar/bubblecar nut, as you will probably see in this post! That is probably because my dad has been buying and restoring them for over 30 years (his first car was an Isetta, and he still has his 1st Messerschmitt!).

One of my dads cars was a Nobel 200. Some of you will know its the english licensed Fuldamobil S7, I'll get to that later in the post!

When we moved down to France (around 2000), I used to play around in the Nobel a lot (its a wreck!). My dad then decided that I could have it, and restore it whenever I get better at mechanics. To make a long story short, I have started restoring it, and also have a project KR200 Messerschmitt I discovered for sale here in France, more on my site: http://www.Nobel200.com/ . Since I have made my site, I have looked into many microcars, especially the Nobeland variants.

Back to the article!

I guess its probably best to start of with the Fuldamobil.

The Fuldamobil

Fuldamobil started production in 1950.

There first car was the N Model Prototype, made out of plywood sheet over a wooden "frame". It was a 2 door seater, built in 1950.
http://autolexikon-thyssen.de/abilder/gross/fuldamobil-n-1-a6.jpg

Pleased with the reception, they decided to make another prototype, named the N-1, which I believe was 1951.  I don't believe it went into production after the prototype, if so very few, I only know 1 survivor: http://www.fuldamobil.de/Bild26N1.jpg
http://www.automania.be/files/Image/FULDA%20MOBIL%20(D)/17-Fulda-Mobil%201950%207328.JPG
The N-1 was also plywood sheet over wooden frame, then the N2 was made.

The N-2 model, 1952, although very similar to the N-1, had rear quarter windows, rear seats, and a whopping Sachs 359cc motor (sorry, I don't know engine size of previous models!).

Only 380 N-2 models were produced, and so far 3 have been found and restored.
A Sachs 360cc Roadster prototype was also built.
http://www.fuldamobil.de/Kratzer8.jpg

After the wooden bodied cars, in 1953 NWF made the S1 , with ILO 191cc motor.
http://estb.msn.com/i/DE/2ECCE3F1DEA8E77EF8F6EFFFE3752.jpg
The NWF was built until 1955.

Fuldamobil made 3 other prototypes before production of there next big car. The S-2 prototype used a Sachs 360cc engine, and both S-3 prototypes used a Sachs 200 engine (used in later models).

There next production car was the S-4. The fuldamobil S4 looks very similar ot the NWF, but had a 4th wheel, and a giant rear window! It was powered by a Sachs 191cc motor.
http://microcarmuseum.com/tour/images/fuldamobil-blue02.jpg

No fuldamobil S-5 was built.

The Fuldamobil S-6 was very similar to the S4, but returned to the small rear window, and had a hatch. The suspension was completely redesigned, and also the customer had the choice for a 3 wheeler or a 4 wheeler. It was powered by the same Sachs 200 motor.
http://microcarmuseum.com/tour/images/fuldamobils-6-00.jpg

The most popular model made by Fuldamobil was the S-7. Featuring a completely redesigned body, improved suspension and back to the big window, it ended up quite popular.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/87/MHV_Fuldamobil_01.jpg

The S-7 was popular enough to build under license in other countries such as UK, India, Greece, Argentina, Sweden and Holland.

Not the best article, from my knowledge and internet, can't guarantee everything is 100% right, but should help fill in gaps in your mind about the fuldas!

I will continue soon, about the variants!

Hope you liked it, JP

[Allan L]

Jonathan that's interesting stuff - I hope the anti-link police don't mind the links you've included!

My knowledge of and involvement with Lea-Francis is relevant in that in 1962 York Nobel got L-F to assemble his three-wheelers from components made by Shorts in Belfast. York Nobel had one of the very few examples of the Lea-Francis Lynx with his personal registration (which it still has) YN 200.

[Otto Puzzell]

OK, let's keep it moving, folks.

[JonathanPoll]

Hehe don't worry, I saw its only on the puzzle topics that I cant post links

Allan, I know there is some connection with Lea Francis, but it was only him owning the Lynx, and using thaty number! nobels started in 1958, not 1962, thats when they stopped. We actually have a couple of Nobels: One is mine, the other is my dads!

[Allan L]

Careful, if your Nobels were assembled by Lea-Francis you may find me pressing you to join the Lea-Francis O.C.
I think, without looking it up, that assembly of Nobels was part of a last attempt by L-F to avoid the inevitable closure which happened in 1963.

[JonathanPoll]

Hey Allan,

As far as I know, Nobels had no direct connection with the L-F, the only conection I knew was of Peter York Noble (not Nobel) owning the Lynx.

If you have any old pictures of Nobels, could you please send them over?

The funder of the Nobel was Cyril Lord (used to deal with carpets - The best you can afford, at Cyril Lord!), with Peter York noble at the head of "York Noble Industries" (Don't know why they didnt call the car a Noble, since the sports Noble was established in 1999!).

More history of the Nobel to come, probably this afternoon! Then there will be history of the Bambi, Fram King, Bambino, Hans Vahaar and Attica! There is one I missed, don't worry about that

JP

[JonathanPoll]

The Nobel 200

First of all, just so you knowe, the history of the Nobel is not well known, this is a quick "resume" of what I have in my old mags.

The Nobel, first announced in June 1958, started production soonly after, in august 1958.

The chairman of the York-Noble Industries Limited was Cyril Lord (well I thought he was the funder, he must have done that aswell), the technical advisory director was the famous racer Mike Hawthorn.

For Allan, the txt I have about Lea-Francis's connection is the following:

"Plans had been in hand for the York-Noble company to be merged with the manufacturers of Lea Francis cars, but simultaneously with the other demise of the Nobel, Lea Francis announced that they were pulling out of car manufacture completely. some progress had aparently already been made, and the publicity registration number YN 200 was seen again on the prototype Lea Francis Lynx in about 1960, but this car never progressed beyond the devellopement stage, and was the last car Lea Francis made. The Lea Francis company was would up in 1963, effectively crushing any possibility that the Nobel name would ever be seen again."

Also, apparently they wanted to reintroduce the Lea Francis with Jaguar engines in 1978, I have no idea what it ended up as.

Here is a nice old picture, of them has Mike Hawthorn standing through the sunroof of a Nobel. The suprising bit is, I have only ever heard and seen of 1 Nobel with a sunroof... Its currently in the USA (Bruce Weiner collection - You have to check it out, its outstanding!). Maybe its the same car?

More history to come! This was brief history of the company. Next, more about the car and the prototypes!

JP

[JonathanPoll]

Ill update later... I tried updating, but had many ;probnlems with the uploader... It keeps sating "you already tried to upload this image" or "you have already submitted this opost"...

About 20 mins through, not done. I give up for now, expect an pdate this afternoon!

[Allan L]

It keeps stating "you already tried to upload this image"

Yes, it doesn't like an image name that has been used before by anyone so most of us have devised our own series with some uniqueness to the names (e.g. starting the name with our own initials). That way inadvertant duplication with other people can be avoided.

[JonathanPoll]

This should be better...

The cars:


The Nobel 200 Prototypes:

There were a few Nobel prototypes. The very first nobel 200's were actually Fuldamobil's with nobel badges on them, but to me there not really Nobels!

I do not know much about these prototypes, its mostly to show you the pictures. If I'm right, the first "Nobel" made was the 1st picture.

The next 3 pictures are either of that same car, or other prototypes.

The 6th picture is of the Nobel Sporty. I don;t know much about it, I'm pretty sure it was built on a normal Nobel chassis. A few more pictures of it attached.

Sorry for this short post, I just don;t have much info about the prototypes!

The next post should be about the normal Nobel 200, and Nobel pickup variants.

JP

[Otto Puzzell]

The missing cars have returned! 

http://www.autopuzzles.com/forum/index.php?topic=17341.0

[JonathanPoll]

The missing cars have returned! 

http://www.autopuzzles.com/forum/index.php?topic=17341.0

Lol, I already saw that post when searching different microcars on this site 

Just you wait until I submit puzzles... I have information on many weird obscure vehicles 

[barrett]

Hey Allan,

As far as I know, Nobels had no direct connection with the L-F, the only conection I knew was of Peter York Noble (not Nobel) owning the Lynx.

I have been looking into the Nobel/ Fulda history for a while for an ongoing article on another website ( http://www.moto-scat.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=6 if you're interested) and as far as I can tell Lea-Francis never actually got around to building Nobels, although they tried! Your information about them going into receivership before production could start roughly matches what I have, but the whole issue seems incredibly clouded - I'm still not entirely sure who actually did assemble the British Nobels - the various component parts seem to have been built by totally different companies and then assembled by a third party.


I'll be interested to see what you know of the Hans Vahaar - I have searched high and low but haven't been able to find a single scrap of evidence that it ever existed. Indian motoring history is an incredibly hard subject to navigate due to the lack of concrete information out there, but even the most obscure Indian cars have some proof out there somewhere - I had written it off as something that never actually made it into production if it even got prototyped, so I'm watching eagerly to see if you can prove me wrong on that point, or even provide a picture of a real live Hans Vahaar...

[JonathanPoll]

... checking that, I found a mystery car I just answered... Kleinschnittger f250s

About the Hans Vahaar... I havent been that interested in that model, because I have never even seen a picture! Maybe the first person who made a story about Fuldamobil and variants added it as a joke and it caught on

Nobel bodies were made by Shorts Brothers, in Belfast. No one knows where the factory was (well, I know someone who has met someone who worked at the factory, I bet he's keeping it secret!).

The adress that is on y Nobel's chassis plate is of the head office, not the factory...

[Otto Puzzell]

Featured: http://www.autopuzzles.com

[JonathanPoll]

Featured: http://www.autopuzzles.com

Thanks! Now I can post my own puzzles at last 

I sort of forgot about this post... I will also think of it being featured as a reminder to finish it! I'll post a couple of puzzles, then work strasight on this...

Thanks again, JP

[Carnut]

Nobel bodies were made by Shorts Brothers, in Belfast. No one knows where the factory was (well, I know someone who has met someone who worked at the factory, I bet he's keeping it secret!).

Short Brothers were of course aircraft manufacturers, making amongst others the WW2 Sunderland Flying Boat.
I didn't know they made car bodies but suppose aluminium bodies have a lot in common whether for aircraft or cars.
My brother-in-law worked there in the technical design department and in fact still does, although whether they are still called Shorts I can't remember!

[JonathanPoll]

Carnut, only the early Fuldamobils were aluminium. All other variants were fibreglass .
I didn;t know about nthe flying boat... A quick google search, its awesome!

The "standard" Nobel 200

The Nobel 200 was built between 1958 and 1962.

The early nobels (first 50 built, including my Nobel which is chassis #17) were all built is a small warehouse, by very few workers. The molds were took from the Fuldamobil, but the "seam" of the mold was right in the middle. Somehow, they built 2 halves, and bonded them together seamlessely from the outside (visible from the inside, but only under the roof lining). Afte the first 50, they started building in a bigger factory (I think when Cyril Lord joined the company).

After the first 50, the cars were offered in either built form, or kit form. I have only seen 1 car in real life that I am sure was kit form, and it had a different interior, so the cars were probably mostly complete, leaving out all of the personnal touches like seat vinyl etc...

The cars were either 3 wheelers or 4 wheelers. If I'm right, about a third of the production were 4 wheelers.

During the 4 years of production, not many changes were made. The main change was the moulding of the body, but that is treally comparing the first 50 cars with the rest of the production.

About 2000 Nobels are believed to have been built, with 500 directly shipped to Chile, to be sold as the Nobel Chile. Most of the remaining were sold in the UK.
I don't have any proof of any officially sold outside of the UK and Chile, but there is one that has been in the USA for many years, one in Turkey (chassis #12. Apaprently it was sold in turkey, but I have no proof. Hopefully it was, then my car would be the earliest UK sold Nobel known   ).

Unlike all of the other variants (Fuldamobil, Bambi, etc...) the Nobels had square section tube chassis, while all of the other variants had round tube chassis.

Some Nobels were "apparently" fitted with Heinkel engines, I only know of a couple, the owners say it seems original. That could have been original, or modified in early years if the car was bought in kit form.

There were 2 models of Nobels sold: The styabdard one, and the pickup (I'll get to that!). The "standard" Nobel was offered in 2 "models". Model A and Model B. The only differences  know off are the dashboard layout (slightly different placing, and switches at other places, one has foot dip switch, other has dash mounted dip switch), and the indicator placement. Earlier cars had the indicators on the roof, then later cars had them under the headlights, slightly to each side/offset (see 1st photo. PHoto of Kit Form Nobel with offset lights)).

Photo 2: american nobel

Next about the pickup/vicky !

JP

[JonathanPoll]

The Nobel Pickup

The Nobel Pickup, although quite similar to the normal Nobel, used a different body moulding to start of with. The rear is a lot more rounded on a pickup, and the "nose" is also more rounded.

I have never seen one, and they are EXTREMELY rare (I think only 1 survivor!), but I'm guessing it uses the standard Nobel chassis and engine (Sachs 200).

Hardly anything is known about them. All I know is that there were 2 "models". The Pickup and the Vicky. I don;t even know what the difference is. All I can see is that some have different "fence bars" on the back.

The last picture is NOT a Nobel, but a Fuldamobil pickup sent to Peter York Noble (not Nobel) to copy.

In a sec I will make a post about the "Bambi Pickup", which there are few surviving (not sure how many different owners there are, but the only owner I know of has about 5!)

Photo time!

JP

[JonathanPoll]

Don't have much about the Bambi Sporty pickup, apart from a load of pictures!

" Based on the Coupe, an SUV was developed called the Bambi Pick-Up Sporty. The body was made from a single piece polyester resin reinforced with Fibre-glass. It was mounted on a tubular Steel chassis. It had no doors and had a long bench style seat that could fit 2 passengers. Behind this, extending the cargo area, had a small rail to keep all of it's contents from falling off. It could alternatively been equiped with a plastic or canvas canopy. It's max speed was 90 KM/h and done 4 litres per 100 KM. The Bambi Sporty Pick-Up had a load capacity of 300 Kg. "
 
Here are some... http://www.rollermobilclub.ch/garage-voll/
Ans dome more on my website: http://www.nobel200.com/bambi-sporty-pick-up.html

Please don't take notice of the price I mentionned on the website, I will have to get aroud to change that!

JP

[Wendax]

No fuldamobil S-5 was built.

As far as I know, the roadster prototype based on the Fuldamobil S-4 was called S-5: