The Steyr 100 and 200 were a series of medium-sized cars built by the

Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...

n manufacturer

Steyr-Daimler-Puch Steyr-Daimler-Puch () was a large manufacturing conglomerate based in Steyr, Austria, which was broken up in stages between 1987 and 2001. The component parts and operations continued to exist under separate ownership and new names. History T ...

AG from 1934 to 1940. The four-door

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body designed by engineer

Karl Jenschke Karl may refer to: People * Karl (given name), including a list of people and characters with the name * Karl der Große, commonly known in English as Charlemagne * Karl Marx, German philosopher and political writer * Karl of Austria, last Austri ...

was manufactured in

Steyr Steyr (; Central Bavarian: ''Steia'') is a statutory city, located in the Austrian federal state of Upper Austria. It is the administrative capital, though not part of Steyr-Land District. Steyr is Austria's 12th most populated town and the 3rd ...

, a 1933 prototype was assembled by Gläser-Karosserie GmbH in

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, Germany.

Design

The cars had a four-cylinder straight

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and a four-speed

manual gearbox A manual transmission (MT), also known as manual gearbox, standard transmission (in Canada, the United Kingdom, and the United States), or stick shift (in the United States), is a multi-speed motor vehicle transmission system, where gear change ...

driving the rear wheels on a

leaf spring A leaf spring is a simple form of spring commonly used for the suspension in wheeled vehicles. Originally called a ''laminated'' or ''carriage spring'', and sometimes referred to as a semi-elliptical spring, elliptical spring, or cart spring, ...

swing axle suspension, a layout already introduced by Steyr on larger cars. The independent front suspension, however, was a first for the company. The four-speed transmission had synchronizations on the top two gears, while the 1.4-liter four-cylinder engine received five main bearings. "Steyr Type 100"
p. 30
/ref> A four-door saloon, two-door convertible, and a bare chassis were available, in addition to a light commercial model called the Steyr 110. The 100 could reach a maximum speed of about . Though not high-powered they could easily climb the Austrian Alpine mountain passes, demonstrated by the

Salzburg Salzburg (, ; literally "Salt-Castle"; bar, Soizbuag, label=Austro-Bavarian) is the fourth-largest city in Austria. In 2020, it had a population of 156,872. The town is on the site of the Roman settlement of ''Iuvavum''. Salzburg was founded ...

governor Franz Rehrl, when on 22 September 1934 he and engineer Franz Wallack travelled the Grossglockner High Alpine Road driving a Steyr 100, about one year before the official opening. In 1935-36 the Austrian travel writer Max Reisch crossed

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(

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, and Laos) in a Steyr 100 and continued his journey through the

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. After 2850 vehicles built the design underwent improvements in 1936, creating the more powerful Steyr 200. An additional 150 examples of a light commercial Steyr 110 had also been built. One technical novelty for the 200 model was the

starter motor A starter (also self-starter, cranking motor, or starter motor) is a device used to rotate (crank) an internal-combustion engine so as to initiate the engine's operation under its own power. Starters can be electric, pneumatic, or hydrauli ...

, which also doubled as an

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. The 200 also received an updated body, with a somewhat larger (still split) rear windshield. In late 1937 the grille was redesigned to match the larger 220 model, losing the central bar but gaining a "200" script, and of a convex rather than concave shape. 5040 such vehicles were produced until 1940.

References

{{reflist Steyr-Puch vehicles Rear-wheel-drive vehicles Sedans 1930s cars

Design

See also

References