Jowett - Early History

Early History

Jowett was founded in 1901 by brothers Benjamin (1877—1963) and William (1880—1965) Jowett with Arthur V Lamb. They started in the cycle business and went on to make V-twin engines for driving machinery. Some early engines found their way locally into other makes of cars as replacements. In 1904 they became the Jowett Motor Manufacturing Company based in Back Burlington Street, Bradford. Their first Jowett light car was produced in February 1906 but as their little workshop was fully occupied in general engineering activities, experiments with different engine configurations, and making the first six Scott motorcycles, it did not go into production until 1910 and then after more than 25,000 miles of exhaustive trials.

Their intention was to provide a low weight vehicle at a low price and with low running costs. The prototype could be described as England's first real light car. Engine and gearbox were specifically designed for a light car and made largely of aluminum. Its low speed torque and gear ratios were ideally suited to the hills about Bradford and Yorkshire's terrain where poor roads provided little use for a high top speed or quick acceleration. Construction of the engine and the rest of the car was robust. Benjamin Jowett held that their light car class was suffering from engines either from cyclecars with sufficient power but subject to rapid deterioration because of inadequate bearing surfaces, or engines from larger cars too heavy for the rest of the car's structure leading to a different set of troubles. The Jowett engine was designed and built for a light car.

The production car "quickly became popular". It used an 816 cc flat twin water-cooled engine of 6.4 hp and three-speed gearbox with tiller steering. The body was a lightweight open two-seater. Learning popular opinion was that 10 hp was a minimum Jowett advertised their third car as being 8 hp without changing the specification. Twelve vehicles were made before an improved version with wheel steering was launched in 1913 and a further 36 were made before the outbreak of the First World War when the factory was turned over to munitions manufacture. Two tiller steerers still survive.