Ader

The Ader was a French automobile designed and built by Clément Ader, a pioneer in flight and telephone service.

The Ader car was built in Levallois-Perret, Seine, by his Société Industrielle des Téléphones-Voitures Système Aderbetween 1900 and 1907. The company first built bicycles in 1869 and tried steam powered aeroplanes between 1890 and 1897. In 1900 the first car was made with a V-twin engine of 904 cc and chain drive. In 1901 shaft drive was introduced along with a four cylinder car where the engine was essentially two of the V-twins coupled together. Two of the four cylinder engines were joined to make a 3616 cc V-8 which was fitted to a car that ran in the 1903 Paris-Madrid race. That year Ader listed twin-cylinder cars of 904 cc and 1571 cc, as well as four-cylinder ones of 1810 cc and 3142 cc; each was available in a wide range of coachwork. A 24 hp vertical four was introduced in December 1903 at the Paris Salon.

A new company was formed in 1905 to separate car building activities from the other activities and registered as Société Ader. The V engines were dropped in favour of the vertical ones in 1907 but this was the final year cars were made though the V-4 engines were made for supplying to other car and boat makers for a few years.

The Ader car was sold in the United Kingdom as the Pegasus.

In 1903 the company also made a shaft driven motor cycle sold as the Moto-Cardan.