1900 BUGATTI Type 2 3.1

Vehicle Overview

This is the first four-wheel vehicle built by Ettore Bugatti, and it is considered the base foundation for the French carmaker. He unveiled it in 1901.

The young Ettore Bugatti was employed by Prinetti & Stucchi bicycle builder. At 17 years, the young Frenchman was fascinated by the new, self-propelled vehicles. There were not too many around, but there were enough to ignite the young boy’s imagination. He took a tricycle, stuck an engine under the rider, and that was the beginning. Supported by Count Gulinelli, the young apprentice built a four-wheeled vehicle in 1900 and showed it at an international exhibition in Milan. It won an award from the French Automobile Club. The luck seemed to end for the enthusiast teenager when the count died later that year, but the Bugatti Type 2 was already known.

In the same year, the De Dietrich company from Niederbronn, Alsace, was very interested in the young man’s project and wanted to produce it. Ettore was underage, and he couldn’t sign the contract to sell the car’s patent, so his father, Carlo Bugatti, signed the dotted lines.

A year later, Barron de Dietrich signed an employment contract with Carlo Bugatti when he hired the young Ettore to run the manufacturing process on July 2nd, 1902. Soon, Ettore understood the principles of car building, and his skills became more refined.

The Type 2 was the first product. It was a small, two-seat roadster. Its 3.1-liter engine at the front sent the power to the rear wheels via a chain.