Lot 191

Elliott Brothers, London

Chronograph for Motor Car Races

An extremely rare racing chronograph for car racing of historical interest with paper tape recorder control, formerly used by the Automobil Club de France.

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The large transport case contains the removable chronograph (225 x 225 x 135 mm) with English lever escapement and a recorder for paper strips (of which four original ones are still present as well as the technical drawing of the wiring diagram of the electrical system) elaborately made in the style of the time and with a lot of decorated brass. Under the chronograph is a drawer with numerous original accessories such as cables, insulators and ink containers. A voltmeter displaying the old unit "Daniell" made by the German company Dr. Stöhrer Sohn from Leipzig is also part of this extremely rare convolute of the company Elliott Brothers from London. Although there are numerous objects from this company, which existed since the beginning of the 19th century, e.g. also in the London Science Museum, inquiries with English and German oldtimer experts and museums unfortunately revealed that such a chronograph is completely unknown there. We only found what we were looking for by the help of Dr. Thomas Schraven, a profound connoisseur of special timepieces, who was actually able to present us with an article from the journal Science et Vie from 1922, in which there was not only a picture of exactly this chronograph, but also a detailed description of the way in which times were measured with it.
With the aim of measuring ever higher speeds with ever greater precision and, above all, without human error, an electric chronograph was constructed here that firstly recorded the times automatically and secondly recorded them on a strip of paper so that the results of the measurements could be documented in a comprehensible manner. For this purpose, a precision clock with seconds contact is located on the right, which draws a time reference line on the paper strip recorder located on the left at quarter-second intervals. Two other electromagnetically controlled drawing springs are controlled by contacts located in hoses lying across the track; long copper plates held apart by air cushions are compressed as the cars pass over the hoses, thus closing the contact which results in deflections in the normally straight lines marking the lap times next to the time line. A photo of these lane contacts can be found in the same article, but they have probably been lost, while many small parts have survived.
As early as 1922, the text draws attention to the fact that only two examples of this apparatus exist. One at the Automobile Club de France, the other at the race track in Brookland, England - another surprise, as the associated racing museum couldn't provide any informations on the Elliott chronograph in response to our earlier enquiry.
Once again, we would like to thank Dr Schraven for his help.
The Elliott Brothers company was founded by William Elliott (1780 - 1853) in 1800, after he had served an apprenticeship with compass and instrument maker William Backwell. Around 1850, he took his sons Frederick Henry and Charles Alfred into the business. Toward the end of the 19th century, the company became the best-known manufacturer of telegraph equipment, and later, in the early 20th century, the construction of instruments for aviation became significant. In the mid-1960s, the company employed more than 35000 employees, but also became a target of takeovers, so that after several mergers and sales, the name Elliott disappeared and eventually merged into the British BAE Systems.