Bonneville

Louis Bonneville began as a mechanic at Villeneuve-sur-Lot and moved his activity to Toulouse in 1894, after several years of bicycle manufacture. The motor business operated from 52 Boulevard Lazare-Carnot, with workshops at 3–5 Rue Castellane and facilities or branches reported in Biarritz and Villeneuve-sur-Lot. Automobile manufacture under the Bonneville name began in 1897. The best-documented early product was the Train-Cycle developed with A. Cazeneuve and described in La Locomotion Automobile on 6 January 1898. It transformed a familiar De Dion-Bouton petroleum tricycle into a two-seat quadricycle by substituting a steerable two-wheel forecar axle for the original front fork; the conversion was reversible. A two-seat single-axle trailer could make a four-person road train, and Cazeneuve's manually selected change-speed gear addressed hill climbing. Bonneville also made a structurally distinct light voiturette on a tubular chassis, with rear-mounted De Dion-Bouton power, lever steering and a three-speed gearbox. Rated at 5 CV, it had a 1,700 mm wheelbase, 1,200 mm width, 700 × 80 tyres and two- or four-seat tonneau/vis-à-vis body choices, and was advertised at 4,500 francs. Because surviving sources preserve no factory type designation for that car, the catalog calls it 5 CV Voiturette rather than inventing a name. Automobile production ended around 1900; the later fate and formal dissolution date of the bicycle business are unknown, so 1900 marks the end of documented motor manufacture rather than a proven corporate liquidation. The complete recoverable range is represented by the Train-Cycle and purpose-built 5 CV Voiturette. Trailer and seating arrangements remain configurations, while Pontiac and Triumph products named Bonneville are unrelated.

Text adapted from “Bonneville” on Wikipedia ↗ · CC BY-SA 4.0 ↗