I have treated my Chummy to a new exaust system. The old silencer was fitted into the large holes at the ends of two crossmembers but a look at some original pictures of chassis, for instance the white painted 1929 chassis for the Motor Show, the rear of the silencer appears ro be attached under the rear crossmember.
Should there be a bracket of some kind to hold the rear of the silencer. And what should go through the large hole in the plate extension on the rear of the silencer?
I can probably work something out but wondered if anyone has the answers.
Regards
Brian

If you look at the Austin List of Spare Parts (e.g. here), on page 22 you will see the original pattern of silencer, which had an integral tail-pipe about 7" long. You can see from the arrangement of the mounting brackets (front & back) that both pipes fit through the holes in the chassis.

David

As David has said the original 28 silencer was fitted into the holes in the front and rear Xmember with a bracket on the bottom of each end of the silencer bolting to the bottom of each member with 5/16" bolts. It all changed for the 29 models, the front goes through the hole in the Xmember while the rear is slung underneath the Xmember with a bracket on top of the silencer picking up on the underside of the rear member. A tail pipe extending back to the rear of the car now replaces the ‘stubby’ pipe formally used, and is held with a very long bracket that is fitted on to the N/S chassis extension. I think that most of the 1928 repros (at least the ones I have seen) are wrongly made to hang under the rear Xmember
Ian

Many thanks for the answers Ian and David. The Car was built in late 1928, one of the early coil engined ones and so I imagine would be a 1929 model. I have a List of Spare Parts dated Jan 1929 and this shows the same silencer as the 1926 parts list. I have also had a look at the November 1929 parts list and this shows a silencer with only one bracket, at the rear, and has the long tailpipe. The illustration also shows that the inlet stub is angled upwards.
I have fitted the new silencer using the large holes in the crossmembers and, although not strictly kosher because of the design, it will do the job.
As always, many thanks to forum contributors for their help
Regards
Brian

By September '29 (or thereabouts) the exhaust was back to its original position: there seems to have been much apparently pointless tinkering with the design around this period. An illustration in the Source Book (p.254, uncaptioned but associated with the AE van entry) shows a downpipe running almost horizontally, with a short reverse curve to mate with the silencer: this on a gate change, geared starter chassis, while the same pattern appears on a later (ball change) chassis on p.17 of Original Austin Seven. This arrangement explains two things:

Why there is no cut-out for the exhaust in the valance of the AE tourer (Source Book p.252).

Why the inlet stub of the silencer is angled upwards in the Nov '29 parts list. By then, however, the design of the downpipe had apparently been changed yet again!

Does anyone supply downpipes to the late '29 pattern?

John