MOTORING

Hawera Star, Volume XLVII, 10 March 1928, Page 15

MOTORING

SILENCERS AND SPEED. TESTS ON A MOTOR-OYCLK. Henry Le Vack, the crack-a-jaek English''speed king, handed a knock-out punch to the “no-silencer, more speed” advocates recently He slipped along at 69.78 milts per’ hour on a 350 c.e. machine with a side-car. r lhe pleasing lea tore of the performance was that his motor-cv cle was lifted with the new oilieial silencer. 'So now, perhaps, tiie rea. enemies or motor-cycling who disturb the peaceful hours both day and night with excellent imitations o. a Gatiing gun will listen to the horse sense news and mend their ways in future —if only as a minor contribution to the observance of the golden rule. RAPID TYRE DEFLATER. .Releasing the air from tyre tubes fitted with spring plunger vanes of the Schrader type usually takes the lorm of holding 'down the "plunger with the anger nail or removing the valve inside—both tiresome jobs. A useful little tool, which may be made irom an ordinary Schrader valve cap, will ooviate this nuisance and make tyic deflation easy. To make this device, first remove the rubber washer which you will find inside the cap, then drill a hole from inside through the top of the cap to take a piece of l-16in. wire. Insert the wire, which should protrude centrally halivVay down the threads in the cap; cut off flush with the top of the cap, and soldier. Care shall’.d be taken that the wire is central inside the cap when soldering. * hour smalt holes should now be drilled through the rounded part of the cap to adow the air to escape when the cap is screwed on to the valve. AMATEURJ’AINTING. NEW ERA IN SMARTENING CARS. Brush-on cellulose lacquers belong to an entirely new paint-world. They are one of tne latest, and perhaps one or the greatest triumphs of the modern industrial chemist. They consist basically or celluloid dissolved in tuny, aceate, having the familiar “pear-drop” smell; one speaks of them as lacquers, and looks upon them as varnish colon nr made with celluloid varnish instead or the ordinary kind. C'ellurose. lacquers are remarkably easy to use, ana work under the brush very milch like enamels. They would appear to be ideal for all the little odd jobs about a car vit titan amateur oiten wishes to carry oui himself, such as touemng up voniroi Joels, painting tool-boxes, ana the hundred and one things for winch.one has nitherto useu enamel. v,n the bouy or the car it is an essential to have a good samice .or cehulose, as it is ror paint or ciiame.. l he necessity tor rubbing down prior to any Kind of painting is not fully, realised until one has had some little experience, The o.d paint must be perfectly bard and ary; cellulose will blister new paint. ■ This can scaive»y be reckoned a disadvantage, lor no one uould want to cellulose a newly painted car. tor the same reason it would not Le ad.isable to use coachpainte, s' slopping. Hopping matte or cella.oid can Do obtained .tom the cellulose lacquer maiiu.actureis, and shallow chipped places can re tilled with repeated doses of eellu.ose exact.y in the depressions, t»o bringing tnem up level with the rest of the surface-. As it dries in an hour, these i epeated doses—there may be three, or lour—are no particular drawback. in working with these paints one has constantly to be reminding oneself that it is not enamel and that it nas nothing to do with paint, its ways are diuerent. Brushes, .or example, mast not be cleaned with turps. \S hen wet they clean perfectly well with hot water ancl soap. If they have dried, the makers' special solvent o thinners will clean them; or they can ue placed in the eellu.ose for a few minutes to soften them. It is best to buy all tiie material for a job from one maker, and to use also the brushes supplied by the same concern. As one has to purchase a brush, one may as well have one especially suited to the consistency of the cellulose ; some cellulose is a little thicker than others, as is the case with enamels. It is quite a small point, perhaps, but worth mentioning as one occurring in actual experience. The brushes supplied are soft, and wide ones are recommended. The makers’ printed instructions should be fallowed, as far as one can, but here, again, practical experience shows that considerable latitude is possible. All makers seem agreed upon the desirability or a full, flowing coat, which means that the brush should be deeply dipped and the excess lightly scraped off on llie edge of the tin. This gives a full brush, Without any dropping off between the tin and the work. The cellulose is applied quite lightly, no heavy pressure being laid upon the brush, neither should it be dragged or daubed about in all directions. The aim is to lay it where it is wanted and leave it there. As beginners generally put paint on much too thickly, they should lie nearlv right at once with cellulose. Too much is indicated by the paint going in “runs.” If it should, leave them; they will mb down easily, and can be touched in and surfaced without leaving any traces. This is one of the advantages of cellulose. It is paint and varnish in one, alike all through.

MOTOR_RACING. COSTLY, HITT WORTH IT. The modest motorist to-dav, who ambles serenely about the country in a natty little tOh.p. car that has cost him round about BI2OD, is very apt to say, “This racing is all tosh. What good has it ever done me?” The question is a natural one, and the answer simplicity itself. If it had not been for racing there would be no such tiling as the sort of car lie drives at anything like the price he paid for it, and with anything like such admirable qualities of reliability, pace, and economy. When the early light-cars (as opposed to cycle-cars) were first introduced, they were largely scorned as unpractical', but the racing policy, which by that time makers of big cars had mostly dropped, soon brought them to Idie stage of reasonable perfection, since when they have become the essentially British type of car which e\ ery day is gaining more patronage in all parts of the world. Here it may be mentioned that just because a firm has never raced on its own account it has not necessarily failed to take advantage of racing experience. It has merely acquired its information vicariously. Her the mest part the whole trend of racing lias been the development of a greater output of power from an

engine oi given size.. On the one side there June been the authorities oi Britain, America, .Frances, Belgium, ita.y, and other countries steadily reducing the limits of cylinder capacity in order to moderate speeds. On the other side there have been the enterprising designers who have won all along the line, as is proved by toe i act that speeds, in spite of the diliiculties introduced into both natural and artificial courses, have steadily increased. Take racing from the tyre' point of \iew Those who ‘‘cannot see the sensed' in motor racing might do worse than realise that the 12,(XX) or 15,000 miles’ iiie which we now habitually get irom a set of quite ordinary pneumatics is purely and simply a' result of racing, for racing has forced tvremakers into improving their product fare more quickly than would otherwise have been the case. From a technical point of view, as well, indeed, as from that of public interest in racing as a spectacle, the road event is superior to any other, and it is only because it is banned by the law that it has not come into prominence in Britain and America. On the Continent a spirit of greater enlightenment prevails, and the big road races in France, Italy, Belgium and Spain have thus commonly borne an international aspect. The expense of participating in these races, which means the building of special cars for the purpose is considerable, and this fact, combined with the disturbance of production of ordinary models which the “specials” imply, lias tended to attenuate the entry lists. It is frequently said that motor firms race for the purpose of obtaining advertisement. Doubtless they are not unmindful of the value which belongs to u conspicuous victory—it is, after all, largely the quest of fame that makes people try to do better than has ever been clone before —but they would be foolish to regard advertisement as the main object.. It is just as easy to destroy a reputation as to build it up. Baring may be a costly business, but it enables experimental work that otherwise would take years to be compressed into a few weeks, if not hours. And, singularly enough, it is one of those tilings from which even more is learned by failure than by success.