The Grégoire-IHA Collection
The Grégoire - Aluminium Pechiney Collection, property of Alcan Inc.

Multi-talented engineer Jean-Albert Grégoire (1899-1992) is a familiar name to automotive historians because of his technical innovations. They primarily concern two areas: front-wheel drive and vehicle weight reduction through the extensive use of aluminium-based light alloys. Long-term cooperation between Grégoire and L’Aluminium Français began in 1930. It resulted in prototypes that had varied industrial fortunes, but all attested to their designer’s ingenuity.

Around 1965, Grégoire built up a collection of his models that he then handed over to Aluminium Pechiney, the heir to L’Aluminium Français. The collection now belongs to the Alcan group.

Grégoire died a few weeks before the inauguration of a museum zone dedicated to the collection at Colline de l’Automobile in La Défense (Paris). In 2001, it was transferred to the Sarthe motor museum at the Le Mans 24-hour racetrack (France).


Automotive aluminium: Jean-Albert Grégoire’s main contributions
The foremost items are:

• 11 prototype cars, including the Tracta, the first front wheel-drive car, with which Grégoire enjoyed success in the Le Mans 24-hour race from 1927 to 1930; the Amilcar Compound (1937), the first car with a cast aluminium skeleton; and the AFG (1942), a prototype on which the Dyna Panhard (1951) was based.
  
• 3 cast polished aluminium alloy chassis: AFG, Grégoire Sport and CGE Grégoire.
  
• 5 aluminium spare parts: differential case, front wheel-axle unit, engine housing, centre pillar and drum wheel.

At the Le Mans museum, the collection is enhanced by two prototype cars that were already housed there: the originally electric CGE TUDOR in which J.-A. Grégoire set an autonomy record in 1942 (250 km at an average of 42.3 km/h) and the SOCEMA Grégoire, the first French turbine-powered car.
Finally, the museum exhibits various objects and documents belonging to Grégoire’s estate, including models, paintings, medals, books and manuscripts.

IHA and the Collection
At the time of the collection’s transfer to Le Mans, the Sarthe local council, Aluminium Pechiney and IHA signed an agreement under which Aluminium Pechiney delegated management and conservation of the Grégoire collection to IHA.
In the same spirit, Grégoire’s heirs and Aluminium Pechiney put IHA in charge of processing and managing his archives, which were deposited with Pechiney (now Alcan), particularly the technical documents relating to the collection.


Sarthe motor museum:
Musée Automobile de la Sarthe
Circuit des 24 Heures du Mans
B.P. 424
72009 Le Mans Cedex - France
Tel: (33) 02 43 72 72 24
Fax: (33) 02 43 85 38 96
E-mail : museumauto@sarthe.com