THE FREE WHEEL

Evening Post, Volume CIX, Issue 57, 8 March 1930, Page 27

THE FREE WHEEL

EASY G£AR CHANGING

»ND ECONOMIC RUNNING

:. l ■The whole''history, .of ..the development 'o* the-:nio£-o-r- vehicles Shows that the gear ehange>,mccha7iism 'has always -b"een ''regarded :ns' a: necessary evil. . All ■kinds of devices'have .been' adopted and ■suggested to: do ■'■away with it; It pcr-sists—arKpwin-'licrsist; flfinks an English writer, so Jong- as wo propel our vehicles by means of reciprocating internal combustion engines, ,and so we have made the best of it —and a very good best it has turned out to be, for nowadays tho makers supply us with gears which arc reasonably silent on the indirect drives and do not wear and aro. easily controlled.

But even here, he says, we shall see advanoes. The introduction of tho free wheel was a long time coming, but now that it hasi'como no one who has tried it can sayf.'that it is not a great improvement. Indeed, so great ait improvement must, in the very /nature of things, litcet with a very widely extended 'adoption.- It makes for easy gear-changing. On this score alone it

would prove successful but it also makes for fuel economy, and when it is so fitted that the fixed wheel can be had at will it gives all the advantages of engine braking, if required, and all the freedom of running independently of the: engine, and.the. certainty of easy, noiseless, and sure gearchanging. ■■-■"." ...;■' The introduction of the free, wheel will also probably induce tho makers to fit four-speed gears more often. _A four-speed 'gear is a sensible device because it gives one so. much greater a range of speed in hill climbing.

Tho ease with which the gears can be changed in the case' of a vehicle fitted with a free wheel will do away with the Liigbear of tho gear change and will induce owners to ask for fourspeed boxes where they were previously satisfied with three.