The Bugatti

Bugatti

Automobiles E. Bugatti was a French car manufacturer founded in 1909 in Molsheim, Alsace, as a manufacturer of high-performance automobiles by Italian-born Ettore Bugatti....

 Type 52 was a half-scale Bugatti Type 35

Bugatti Type 35

The Type 35 was the most successful of the Bugatti racing models. Its version of the Bugatti arch-shaped radiator that had evolved from the more architectural one of the Bugatti Type 13 Brescia, was to become the one that the marque is most known for though even in the ranks of the various Type 35s...

 electric

Electric vehicle

An electric vehicle , also referred to as an electric drive vehicle, uses one or more electric motors or traction motors for propulsion...

 racing car for children. About 500 examples were produced at the Molsheim

Molsheim

Molsheim is a commune in the Bas-Rhin department in Alsace in north-eastern France. The total population in 2006 was 9,382. Molsheim had been a very fast growing city between the French censuses of 1968 and 1999, passing from 5,739 to 9,331 inhabitants, but this increase came to a noticeable halt...

 factory between 1927 and 1936, and the cars were frequently used both as playthings and for more serious racing among the children of the European elite.The number 52 was probably given by the late Hugh Conway and
was never used by the factory.The factory always referred the car as Baby.

The first example of a Type 52 was built for Ettore

Ettore Bugatti

right|thumb|Ettore Bugatti in 1932Ettore Arco Isidoro Bugatti was an Italian-born and French naturalized citizen automobile designer and manufacturer....

's son, five year old Roland, and was first shown at an exhibition in Milan.

The Type 52 was powered by a single 12 volt electric motor with front and reverse. Braking was done by way of expanding wooden shoes at the front and rear drums

Drum brake

A drum brake is a brake in which the friction is caused by a set of shoes or pads that press against a rotating drum-shaped part called a brake drum....

.

The car was originally just 1200 mm (47.2 in) between the wheels, but this was expanded to 1350 mm (53.1 in) when it was found that even children had difficulty with leg room. The car was about 1800mm long overall with a 625 mm (24.6 in) track width.