LATEST DEVELOPMENTS IN MOTOR TRACTION

Dominion, Volume 21, Issue 232, 2 July 1928, Page 12

LATEST DEVELOPMENTS IN MOTOR TRACTION

The exhibition in picture form of one of the lats-t developments iu motor trac-tion—-the six wheeled vehicle —attracted a large audience to the De Luxe Theatre on. Friday. The pictures were explained by Major Jennings, D.S.O. Major Jennings remarked that out of the "tank,” a. British invention which made its appearance in warfare in 1916, had been developed ; certain mechanical principles applicable to vehicles for other than warpurposes. He showed a series of pictures, in which six-wheeled vehicles were being put through very severe trials in England over exceedingly rdugh, unroaded country, on grades of 1 in 3. and 1 in 5, with “rotten” formations, and through scrub and swamps. The pictures were of exhaustive experiments carried , out by the Royal Army Ordnance Corps, under War Office instructions. /. There were shown enrs, lorries, aiid vans, singly and; as convoys, being put, through , tests which were conducted by Army officers with the object, it was stated, of collecting. data for military purposes. The vehicles were shown mounting steep hills, crossing rivers and ditches, traversing bogs, and fording streams. They .were also shown’ being tested under wintry conditions, ploughing t' "ough snow and mud over the axles. The application of the sixwheel principle had been found of great service, said Major Jennings, in roadless tracts of country in India and China, standing up as well as the British testings as shown in the pictures. The audience showed particular interest in the “close-ups” of the mechanism, which enabled the four back wheels to travel each at a different height.