The ' CVT ' Cyclecar Mystery (UPDATES : Turicum ? .. or La Ponette ?)

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Fabrizio Taiana of Italy wrote us: "Dear sir we have in our stable a small car (only chassis) equipped with a 2 cylinder engine, chain drive and a special gearbox with variable transmission . It is a right hand drive. It was bought in France in the seventies. The chassis is small and light. It is not a Maxwell, it might be a GWK or a BABY. We cannot identify it. It would be great if someone could help?" [email protected] UPDATE by Detlef Kayser (Berlin):"The radiator of the mystery car looks quite a lot like the radiator of La Ponette sold lately in Geneva by auction from the Tua collection. As far as I know the La Ponette also sports friction drive...."
UPDATE II by Fer Cools, NL:"this may be a Turicum from Zurich, CH. That also had this fricion drive."
Update III by Fons Alkemade: "First of all, I wouldn't call this car a cyclecar but that may be a matter of taste or definition. I can agree that the mystery car looks very much like the La Ponette from Geneva, but (1) I cannot find any sources which tell me that La Ponette used friction transmission; (2) La Ponette seems to have made only 1 and 4 cylinder models. So, I think, the mystery remains very much a mystery."
Update IV by Kit Foster: “The March issue of The Automobile shows on page 23 a photo of the 9 hp 1913 La Ponette sold from the Tua collection by Osenat. As Detlef Kayser has pointed out, the radiator looks exactly like that of the mystery car.”
Update V by Urs Reisel from the Swiss Automobile History Research who wrote: “This is not a Turicum. The only similarities are the engine look and the friction drive system. But Turicums look very different:
1. the Turicum friction (spoke) wheel is not cast like on the photo, but pressed sheet metal 2,5mm
2. the mounting of the friction drive to the chassis looks very different (Turicum is much lighter and simpler)
3. no Turicum has a fly wheel between engine and the cast iron disc of the friction
4. Turicums have all steel wheels with solid steel tube spokes (9 or 10 in front, 10 in rear). 4x11 spokes are the very similar Fischer Wagen.
5. the steering on all Turicums is behind and not in front of the front axle
6. the connection between wheels and axle are very different to the Turicums
7. the radiator looks very different
8. "Turicum" is cast in the cylinder block on the right (magneto) side
9. the crank shaft housing is cast aluminum and shows also a large "Turicum" script on the same (right) side

70% of the actually known survived Turicums worldwide are very exactly documented (photographed and measured) in my computer. I also have a "very large" collection of original Turicum and Fischer brochures, about 150 glass negatives of the factory photos, used to print the brochures, a complete collection of patents including the drawings. The history research of Martin Carl Fischer (engineer of Turicum and Fischer Wagen) is not my passion, but my sickness…. I also have all the survived documents of the Fischer family concerning automobiles (Martin C. Fischer was a watchmaker and engineer of the Magneta - watch system and several Swiss Automobile makes).”

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