Bean Cars

Bean Cars was a brand of motor vehicles made in England by A Harper Sons & Bean, Ltd at factories in Dudley, Worcestershire, and Coseley, Staffordshire. The company began making cars in 1919 and diversified into light commercial vehicles in 1924. For a few years in the early 1920s Bean outsold Austin and Morris.

The company had been a supplier of car parts and in 1911 the company installed drop hammers to increase production and in 1912 the company opened a new forging plant in Smethwick. At the same time George Bean served as Mayor of Dudley in 1908, 1911 and 1912.

After the war Bean needed a product to replace the gap left by the end of military contracts so Bean entered the increasingly active car market by becoming a car maker. The manufacturing rights for the pre-war Perry car were for sale so in January 1919 A. Harper & Sons & Bean bought them for £15,000, giving it a quick entry into the car market. It set up a new factory in Hurst Lane, Coseley, to make the chassis, which were then driven to Dudley where the company's Waddams Pool works built the bodies.

Jack Harper Bean was managing director of the company and he visited America in order to buy the latest machinery for car-making. Bean became one of the first UK companies to adopt twin moving track assembly lines. Bean also wanted to form a consortium of manufacturers along the lines of the General Motors model. He brought together a group of companies including the vehicle makers Swift and Vulcan, the steel-maker Hadfields, and the Regent Carriage company and together they formed Harper Bean Limited in November 1919.

Harper Bean Limited offered its shares for sale for which buyers would be required to pay £6 million though only £1.5 million would be offered to the public. The £6 million proceeds would be used to buy:

99 per cent of shares in A Harper Sons & Bean Limited of Dudley, Tipton and Smethwick
166,666 shares in Hadfields Limited of Hecla Works, Sheffield to a value of £250,000
60 per cent of the shares in The Vulcan Motor and Engineering Co Limited of Crossens Southport
50 per cent of the ordinary shares in Swift of Coventry Limited, Cheylesmore Coventry
50 per cent of the ordinary shares in British Motor Trading Corporation Limited (Motor Union Insurance—AA)
50 per cent of the ordinary shares in Harvey Frost Limited (of Great Portland Street, distributors of recovery cranes)

together with Rushmores (1919) Limited, Jigs Limited, Regent Carriage Co Limited,

Gallay Radiator Co Limited, Aeromotor Components Limited and Alex Mosses Radiator Co Limited

Harper Bean Limited would carry on the business of ironfounders, metalworkers and manufacturers and distributors of motor vehicles.

After investment in the above companies the balance of the new capital would be used to:

: expand the plant of Harper Sons and Bean used for drop forgings, castings, stampings and kindred products and to extend the plant for the Bean car to 50,000 cars per annum

: lay out a plant to produce another 50,000 complete engine and transmission units for Vulcan, Swift and other motor manufacturers

: develop plant to produce Bean’s patented aluminium alloy body

: increase Vulcan production from 500 to 10,000 motor vehicles per annum

: increase Swift output to six times the current level

Distribution was intended to be carried out through British Motor Trading which belonged to the Automobile Association's Motor Union Insurance

Initial plans called for annual production levels of 50,000 small cars together with 25,000 medium size cars and a further 25,000 lorries or commercial vehicles. Financial commentators noted the company's financial structure was "rather complicated".

The new company wanted to emulate the success of the Ford Model T and exhibited its first car at the 1919 Motor Show. Its initial models were two- and four-seat tourers and coupés with prices starting from £425. By early 1920 the company was making 80 chassis a week and Bean's Dudley plant could not produce enough bodies, so it ordered 2,000 bodies from Handley Page of Cricklewood. In 1920 2,000 Bean cars were made. Production resumed early in 1922 and the company was making 100 cars a week by August.

In October 1923 the company launched a new and much improved model, the Bean 14, with a 2.3-litre engine and a four-speed gearbox. About 4,000 of all the variants were made up to 1929.

But A Harper, Sons & Bean was still short of money with debts of £1.8 million, mainly as a result of its restructuring in 1921. Hadfields again rescued the company, The same models were made but there were changes in management with Jack Bean leaving the company and moving to another Wolverhampton manufacturer, Guy Motors.

From 1922 Bean supplied engines for a light car, the Ariel Nine, which was made in Coventry. It was a water-cooled side-valve flat twin engine with "square" dimensions of 85 mm bore and 85 mm stroke, giving it 997 cc displacement. However, the engine was vibratory and noisy, so in 1924 Ariel discontinued the model.

Bean launched a new model, the 18/50, with a 2.7-litre six-cylinder Meadows overhead valve engine. It was in production for only a year, in which time 500 were made. In chassis form it cost £365. Some Bean factories were sold with production concentrated at its Tipton site. It made commercial vehicles from then until 1931, concentrating on the lighter end of the market. The original truck was based on a Bean car, but in 1927 the company launched a larger model with a commercial chassis and a capacity of 30 cwt (about 1,500 kg).

The Coseley factory also made Captain George Eyston's world-land-speed-record car Thunderbolt, which took the record in 1937.

The residential street Bean Road (Dudley DY2) has long existed within of the Dudley factory, while Bean Road (Coseley) gives access to the former Coseley factory site, and the nearby Bean Drive is a cul-de-sac off Thunderbolt Way in Tipton.

Main car models

{| class="wikitable" style="margin:1em auto;"

! Type

! Model

! Year

! Number made

! Engine

! Notes

| 11.9

| 1 (1919–22), 2 (1923–24), 4 (1924–27)

| 1919–27

| 10,000

| 1796 cc four cylinder

| Later called the 12

| 14

| 3 (later the Long 14), 6 (Short 14)

| 1924–28

| 4000 (all 14s)

| 2300 cc four-cylinder

| Became the model 8 14/40 in 1928

| 18/50

| 7

| 1926–28

| 500

| 2692 cc Meadows six-cylinder

| 14/45

| 8

| 1928–29

| see 14

| 2300 cc four-cylinder

| Updated 14, branded as a Hadfield-Bean

| 14/70

| 8

| 1928–29

| see 14

| 2300 cc four-cylinder

| Sports version of the 14/45

thumb|Bean 11.9 (1919-1924)

Survivors

A 1927 Bean 14 coupé was in the Museum of Science and Industry, Birmingham until it closed in 1997. The car is now in Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery's Dollman Street store, which is only occasionally open to the public. The Black Country Living Museum has a 1926 20/25 HP truck as a static exhibit. The National Motor Museum, Beaulieu has a 1928 Short 14 car as a static exhibit. The Bredgar and Wormshill Light Railway in Kent has had a number of Bean vehicles, including a 1923 14 HP Open Tourer that is driven to historic vehicle events both in the UK and overseas. Francis Birtles' record-breaking Bean 14 Sundowner is in the National Museum of Australia. A number of Bean vehicles, most of them 12 HP and 14 HP cars, survive and are driven in private ownership. It is thought about 500 of the six cylindered 18-50 Beans were produced and today around 20 of those are thought to survive. Two are in the UK and a number in Australia.

Main car models

Survivors

See also

Notes

References

External links