Auto Gossip

Press, Volume CXI, Issue 32708, 10 September 1971, Page 9

Auto Gossip

A. J. P.

by

Good clutch life , My comments on the rate at which some motorists go through clutches has drawn a response from one reader, who writes that in half a million miles of motoring, in different cars, he has never had clutch repairs. At least in part, he seems to attribute this to his habit of avoiding “dragster” starts at the traffic lights, which certainly seems a reasonable supposition. But he does ask what is the best way to wait at the traffic lights for the green to appear—in neutral, or in gear? In neutral I’m convinced that one should wait at the traffic lights with the car in neutral, adhering to the rule that you should keep your foot off the clutch pedal when you’re not actually using it If you pay attention to your driving and use any degree of intelligent anticipation, it should be possible to slip into first gear when the flow of traffic from the other direction stops, or when you see the lights for the other traffic turn to amber. There are very few intersections

where one cannot see enough clues to anticipate when the lights are about to change. Not too soon I have heard it said that another reason one should not wait at the lights in gear is that if one’s car is hit from behind, one’s foot can easily slip off the clutch, so that the car leaps forward into the intersection and the path of other vehicles. 1 suppose this is a possibility. But when you do anticipate the change of lights as far as slipping the car into gear is concerned, you should not anticipate them to the extent that you move off before the light have actually changed. “Beating . the lights” is fairly common in Christchurch, and it can, and does, cause accidents. Bus drivers seem particularly prone to do it. Should be better And while I’m on the subject of buses, is it hot

time that buses were equipped with more effective brake-lights? Even if . a bus-driver did give a handsignal to show he was stopping—which is highly unlikely—the sheer the vehicle Would make it almost impossible, for following traffic to see it. But the brake-lights ;on most of the buses in the city seem so weak and comparatively small in area, that it'is extremely difficult to see them. In many buses, in fact, they do not seem to work at all. Stirely a vehicle doing as much stopping and starting in traffic as does a bus should be properly equipped with big, dear stop and turn-signal lights. And don’t tell me that people do not run into the back of buses when they are stopping, because I have seen it happen. On the occasion I did see it, I did not see any form of stopping signal from the bus.