'On Four Wheels' 1978- an autoshite goldmine

[Jozza]

Had visit from fairly-distant relatives at the weekend. They passed on to me (in a 'you're into old cars and stuff, aren't you?' sort of way) something that had been cluttering up their loft for a few years.

 

It's called 'On Four Wheels' and it's an 11-volume, 3,200-page vinyl-bound encyclopedia on the global motor industry as it was in 1978. It covers virtually every manufacturer that had ever existed up to that point and most 'current' manufacturers get a handful of full-colour plates and mini reviews of a sample of their range. It also includes loads of technical articles by LJK Setright (reason enough to keep hold of it IMHO), biographies of 'famous' (i.e obscure) racing drivers with bad facial hair, 'safe driving' tips and articles such as 'Measuring Less Than Nothing- the story of the vacuum gauge'.

 

As you can imagine it's a goldmine of weapons-grade autoshite (if that's not mixing too many metaphors). Whilst scanning in all 2,650 pages is beyond me, I present for your viewing pleasure a sample from the last few pages of Volume 9 (of 11), featuring 1979 model-year cars that were released just as the whole thing went to press.

 

The whole set is on Photobucket HERE

 

Here is surely the highlight (it get's a double-page spread!):

 

 

 

 

 

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[Minimad5]

Great freebie ! Bet that gives many hours of reading enjoyment

[Conrad D. Conelrad]

I bought that same thing at a car boot sale a few years ago. Damn good!

[barrett]

Looks like a good read, I forgot how nice early Alfasud Sprints look.btw, there is a nice feature on Ranchos in this months C&SC incase any of you haven't seen it.

[Lankytim]

Hey, Ive got that somewhere in the loft. Its missing a load of volumes though. Still a great read however.

[Tayne]

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[AXrescuer]

I've got a full hard bound set of On Four Wheels which dates back to 1971/72. Never knew there was a later set.

[garethj]

Looks like a good read, I forgot how nice early Alfasud Sprints look.

I had one just like that, T registration which was the earliest 1500 I’d seen up to just now!Cheers for scanning all those in, plenty of quality reading there. What are the Setright articles about? Here’s one he wrote about the Suzuki Whizzkidhttp://img.photobucket.com/albums/v375/garethj/scans/RWhizzkid013.jpghttp://img.photobucket.com/albums/v375/garethj/scans/RWhizzkid012.jpg

[rover420]

I've got the 1978 / 1979 set too. got it from a bloke i used to work with who'd got it in his teens. I think he said it came weekly or monthly.

[Spottedlaurel]

I picked up Vol’s 1-10 last year at a steam railway when on holiday. About 150 issues I think?

 

 

Well worth a fiver I reckon! I’m not sure if mine are as late as 1978/79, though they certainly include mid-70s cars. Even on makes and models I know well there were photos I’d never seen before. Some good writers in there too, including people like Setright who were on Car at the time.