AC are best known for their sports cars especially the powerful Cobra, but they also have at various times produced Invalid and economy cars.
In fact AC started life in 1908 with the production of a three wheeler called the Sociable.
After the war AC became a major producer of invalid carriages. They, like many other manufacturers of the time also produced a small 3 wheeled car called the Petite to meet the demand for economy transport.
The Petite stayed in production for 5 years from 1953 and two models were produced which became known as the Mk I and the Mk II.
The Mk I used odd sized wheels, the single front wheel being only 8 inches in diameter, and the rear wheels were 18 inches. The Mk II used the same 12 inch diameter wheels all round.
Both cars were fitted with a 350cc single cylinder two stroke Villiers industrial engine, and this was mounted at the rear driving the rear wheels. The engine in the Mk II was very slightly larger than the Mk I, and developed more power. The gearbox was driven by 3 rubber belts.
The body work was aluminium and the car was able to seat 2 adults on the single bench type seat. The styling of the Petite was in many ways similar to the invalid cars, but was scaled up all round. Several thousand Petites were made.
Later on in the early 1970's AC again had plans to enter the 3 wheeler/economy car market. The prototype again used the single wheel at the front format, this time in a larger fibre glass four seat body.
Again the engine was rear mounted (giving better stability on the single front wheel trike layout) and was a fairly powerful twin cylinder 500cc unit made by Steyr Puch.
Sadly, it never reached full scale production.
