IMPROVEMENT OF BRAKES.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVI, 28 May 1927, Page 15

IMPROVEMENT OF BRAKES.

THE HYDRAULIC SYSTEM.

The great amount of attention whmi is being given to the important matter of braking' is most, encouraging to the motoring community. Now that fourwheel braking is becoming so generally adopted, the new car buyer ;is obviously seriously concerned to see that his car is so equipped that the sudden brake application of the man in front shall not .result in a. head to back collision. Brakes to-day are of much greater importance than they were even five years ago. The congested state of our urban and city roads necessitates a very efficient form of deceleration, and tha-y is abundantly being provided by the designers and manufacturers. There is also a tendency—all in the right direction—to do away with complicated mechanisms for the operation ol the brakes. Simplicity of operation is the point aimed at, and many designers have come to the conclusion that there are more suitable ways of operating four-wheel brakes than by a series of levers and .rods, which must, of necessity, .require periodical attention, and aire generally effectually concealed below the bodywork and obscured by the valences, guards, and running boards. These considerations would seem to point to the advisability of giving some greater attention to other means of operating brakes, and already we see Indications that attention is being given to brakes automatically operated by servo-mechanism, or coupled with the controls by some form of hydraulic power-transmitting appliance. The hydraulic brake- is the newest of the newcomers, and it has been having quite- a lot of attention directed to it. Those who sponsor its adoption point with emphasis to the advantage which the system offers in really efficient equalising or compensating of the braking effort on all the- wheels. This matter is important to-day, when we have many road surfaces which are dangerous indeed if unequal braking of the wheels is suddenly applied. The hydraulic system does away with all inequalities in this respect, while it elimi mates a. good deal of .rod and lever mechanism /and eliminates the need for exterior lubrication.

We shall probably see much advance in this direction, and it may be that air brakes—vacuum or pressure —may also come into being.