Last car produced with a starting handle

[wuvvum]

Moggies did have them right to the end - I had a '69 car with a dodgy starter motor which I had to start with the handle. 

 

I'm not sure how a crank handle would work on a Renner Four, what with the gearbox being in front of the engine an' shizz.

[HillmanImp]

^^ that Toledo. I can imagine many an elderly motorist in the 70s eyeing cars without starting handles very suspiciously.

 

http://autoshite.com/topic/15160-electric-handbrakes/

[Micrashed]

How did the starting handle work on the Austin 1100?!

Under the front wheel arch after first removing the wheel

Ah your right, it was probably  Grandads Toledo that I had for a while (also white). One of them backfired and belted my hand so hard I could smell colours.

 

EDIT: Read the comments re Toledo and modifying the flywheel - I never knew that. Sounds about right.

 

EDIT 2: Im going to have to go hunting through the negatives now as Im sure whatever it was didnt have a flip down number plate.

 

EDIT 3: I have no fucking idea what it was, but up to DW's comments would have put money on it being the 1300.

 

Anyway, have a big fook off fire engine with starting handle from when men were real men...

P9010278 by Micrashed, on Flickr

[Des]

I'm seriously thinking about cracking out the matt black and painting in a starter handle aperature to the bumpers of anything I have that's lacking. Or maybe I'll cut some from insulating tape.

[mouseflakes]

I liked the starting handle on the back of my old Renner 10. Quite useful for moving the car around during those times it couldn't move under it's own power, cranking it back and forth using first and reverse.

[Mr_Bo11ox]

 

 

How ace does this Rangey look. Its absolutely perfect!!!!! These things are such a looker, the proportions are just perfect. I could sit and look at this for hours.

[phil_lihp]

That control was very important to remember when hand cranking. If you forgot to retard the ignition a backfire may result whipping the handle backwards in your hand and often causing nasty injury. Likewise kickstarting old motorcycles.

 

Not just old motorbikes, my 1992 CG125 kicked back viciously when I was attempting to start it after refitting the engine, although that was probably because unbenown to me the throttle body was stuck wide open and I'd adjusted the fuel/air mixture far too much in favour of fuel trying to work out why it wouldn't start.  For a little engine, it had quite a punch.

 

Incidentally, I forgot to mention the mixture adjustments to the garage it went to and once he'd cleaned the throttle body out and went to start it, apparently he got a spectacular backfire.  Oops.

 

Anyway, have a video of a chap starting a Niva very easily with a starting handle:

 

http://youtu.be/VnTWvTLU0Mc

 

and a rather pretty old Lada.

 

http://youtu.be/zsGUoljkrDE

 

Good point made, what if you left it in gear?  I assume you'd get run over.

[Micrashed]

As an aside, whats the biggest thing with a starting handle?

Leyland Beaver...

P9010302 by Micrashed, on Flickr

 

680 diesel engine - not sure on cc size though

[chaseracer]

I had a 1980 R4 van with a handle clipped neatly onto an inner wing.    No bumper hole, no front panel hole and no dog...

This would be the polar opposite of Project Drive. And wonderfully, typically French...    <_>

[Pete-M]

I think the only thing I've ever owned which had a starting handle was my Rover P4.

I'm intrigued as to how the starting handle would work on an Austin 1300. Do you have to take a wheel off to crank it or summat?

[oman5]

 

As an aside, whats the biggest thing with a starting handle?

 

Leyland Beaver...

P9010302 by Micrashed, on Flickr

 

680 diesel engine - not sure on cc size though

 

680 refers to cubic inches. 11.1 litres. pretty big.

 

This ww2 Tiger tank has a starting handle and a 23 litre v12 maybach  petrol engine.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ROnb5ouBjNc

 

ok, its an inertia starter rather than a hand crank but still looks bloody hard work.

[Des]

All modern cars without hand cranks are shit.

Was a single car ever made with both timing belt and starter handle? Because that's a belt that would be a pleasure to change.

 

Could be a business opportunity in retrofitting handles, need a suitable hole punch, knock up a selection of dogs from thick walled tube to weld onto front pulley bolt heads and some kind of heavy duty speculum to create an aperture in the radiator.

[Station]

Would it be possible to start a modern (ie 90's) from the crank? Like put some kind of air tool on the bolt and start it?

[Conrad D. Conelrad]

Retrofitting a starting handle to a Toledo is one thing, but you could also retrofit one to your front wheel drive Mini if you really wanted to:

 

 

Galloping to the rescue of Minis with feeble batteries came Oselli Accessories. For about a fiver, (in the mid-1960s) they offered a complete kit of handle, crankshaft dog, guide plates, and a support arm. You had to cut a hole in the wing valance, fit the crankshaft dog in place of the standard crank bolt, and bolt into place the support arm inside the wheelarch. To use the starting handle, you put the wheels on full left lock, and poked the handle through the support arm hole and the hole in the valance, engaged the dog and wound your engine into life – you hoped.

 

[dollywobbler]

All modern cars without hand cranks are shit.

Was a single car ever made with both timing belt and starter handle? Because that's a belt that would be a pleasure to change.

Yes. Citroen GS/GSA again.

[dollywobbler]

Moggies did have them right to the end - I had a '69 car with a dodgy starter motor which I had to start with the handle. 

 

I'm not sure how a crank handle would work on a Renner Four, what with the gearbox being in front of the engine an' shizz.

Citroen managed it with the Traction Avant as far as I know. Presumably a long tube through the gearbox or something?

[scruff]

As long as the clutch wasn't down you could put it on the end of one of the box shafts I guess

[Asimo]

I'm sure this has been posted here before: how to start a truck with muscle using inertia, no HANDLE required.

 

[Vince70]

I remember the the MK1 escort got a starting handle hole, but I think only the van actually got the handle.

[gary_davidson]

do the Brazil made VW type two buses come with a starting handle?

[explosive-cabbage]

All Lada Nivas with 1.6 carb and 1.7 SPI had the ability to accept starting handles, with a hole in the front valance and bumper. The 1.7 MPI Lada Niva had a slight body upgrade and did away with the starting handle holes, but still had the relevant nut on the crankshaft to accept the handle, as the engine still uses the same tooling as the original 1977 engine.

I belive they continued to produce the starting-handle-compatible 1.7 SPI till 2004, in Russia and Uruguay at least.

 

I claim my five pounds.

 

Furthermore, the 1.3 estate Riva was built in Eygpt till 2012, but I am unable to work out weather it was was starting-handle-compatible. I am inclined to believe it probably was if it used original bodywork pressings, regardless of weather or not it was a injection or carb model. Alas, Wiki can only tell you so much.

 

I had the batten over to our Egyptian Autoshite correspondent.

[HillmanImp]

Would a car with a starting handle work in the event of a nuclear war? In that event normal cars would be fooked because of the electro magnetic pulse wouldn't they? I suspect that there were a lot of cars made for people in the 80's that had this capability with the ongoing cold war. 

 

There probably still is. I wouldn't know about it though as I am wearing this tin foil hat.

[rml2345]

Not sure about the last car produced with a starting handle, or the largest for that matter but it was pretty common on commercials during the 1930s.

 

1935 Leyland Octopus TEW8D [ BTD 90 ] "Frank Chivers & Sons" by DC-7C, on Flickr

 

Could ths be a candidate for largest though? The Scammell 100 tonner from the late 1920s;

 

1927 Scammell 100 ton Tractor. by grenvillelawrence, on Flickr

 

Looks like a removable crossmember and a BFO handle to me. 
Starting a car on the handle should be an Autoshite badge of somesort, like having something XUD powered. 

[Conrad D. Conelrad]

Would a car with a starting handle work in the event of a nuclear war? In that event normal cars would be fooked because of the electro magnetic pulse wouldn't they? I suspect that there were a lot of cars made for people in the 80's that had this capability with the ongoing cold war. 

 

There probably still is. I wouldn't know about it though as I am wearing this tin foil hat.

 

Surprisingly, even computer packed moderns shrug off a blast of EMP without much care. In the study quoted there, no cars were disabled by EMP (only temporarily stalled). 

 

Still, I recommend keeping a starter motor in a reinforced faraday cage in your fallout shelter next to your radio and spare batteries, and stay tuned to CONELRAD for further information. 

[Richard]

What was the last UK market car to be sold without an electric starter, only a starting handle?

[mercrocker]

Probably something really utilitarian like the Trojan - these went into van form into the 1950s but I think by then they had electric start.  

[John F]

Possibly the biggest (and heaviest) vehicle that has a starting handle is the early 1940s PzKpfw VI 'Tiger'... here's a video clip of one being started.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ROnb5ouBjNc

[oman5]

As I understand it EMP, were it a strong enough pulse to affect electronics, would fry the engine management system on anything without a points/condenser set up. you would be able to turn it over on the starter but it just wouldn't run.

For ultimate post-nuclear motoring, you want a diesel with a completely mechanical set-up. mercedes w123 240/300d, sierra 2.3d, the rare and shite Standard vanguard diesel even has a decompressor and a hand crank.

[sierraman]

Lada 1300 had one, I've no doubt the riva probably had the facility with those Siberian winters

[Micrashed]

Possibly the biggest (and heaviest) vehicle that has a starting handle is the early 1940s PzKpfw VI 'Tiger'... here's a video clip of one being started.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ROnb5ouBjNc

iN FAIRNESS THOUGH, THAT SET UP IS AN INERTIA fucksocks

As I was saying, an inertia starter - you wind a geared flywheel mass up to a given speed , then drop it onto the crank of the engine and "thunk" you are not actually trying to turn the engine by hand.