Reminiscing again. My old dad also had a 1933 Lanchester 10. Fluid flywheel and pre selector gearbox (My first attempts at driving in that-but he never knew). There were three controls on the steering wheel boss. Mixture-rich/weak. Ignition-advance/retard. Hand throttle. His party piece was to set the ignition to the back position, then use the starting handle to pull the engine just over compression. Lift the bonnet, sit at the wheel and tell some onlooker some tale about a flat battery. Ask the unsuspecting victim to shout 'Go' and the engine would go to tickover- just like that! as he secretly pushed the ignition control to advance. DaveK.
- posted
19 years ago