Trends in Design

Hawera Star, Volume LIV, 4 May 1935, Page 14

Trends in Design

“Turret Top” Roofs the Latest Innovation

Every year it’s something, says the Motor. One year it was four-wheel brakes; another it was balloon then came knee action, and so on. This year it is “turret tops.” The turret top is simply an all-steel roof which should have put in its appearance on motor cars 25 years ago, but which is actually an outstanding innovation for 1035 and one which has been adopted by many prominent American car makers. Gone are the soft tops of imitation leather, chicken wire and cotton batting. Gone, too, the manufacturers of that sticlcy substance known as ‘ ‘ top dressing” when the ears now on the road reach the scrap heap. While steel roofs is the most spectacular innovation, the new ears are in every way ahead of their predecessors. Although less sensational in some of its mechanical and body features than the composite car of previous years, the 1935 automobile marks the peak, to date, of developments which have been under way since 1920. These concern particularly the Tiding qualities of the car, the safety of its structure, its ease of control and its appearance. Bonnet louvres have suddenly been seized upon by the designers as definite points of decoration. This year they are all horizontal, and various decorative treatments have caused them to lend greatly to the ensemble of the new machines.

Streamling is th“ order of the -day in the new vehicles. All the manufacturers have gone further than ever before in making their cars more efficient as to wind resistance and rear vacuum suction.

The interiors of the new cars are somewhat plainer than was the case with their predecessors. But if the interiors look less gaudy, muen has been

done to make them roomier, better ventilated and quieter. Practically all the new cars are insulated against drumming and other noises. Doors and win dows are wider; so are windscreens, in which safety non-shatterable glass is practically universal. The front lines of the cars are- narrower and higher than they were a year ago. With the general adoption of a grille forward of the radiator, it has been possible to do many things to the front end that would have been impossible when the radiator core itself was exposed. Inbuilt luggage compartments are found in many of the now models, in some cases . the spare wheel is still carried in a front-wing well, but a more popular plan is to place the wheel horizontally at the bottom of a luggage boot at the back. In certain cases a steel ramp facilitates removal of the wheel.

Badio is almost universally available and has necessitated an increase in the capacities of dynamos and batteries. Owing to the advent of the steel roof, the aerial now takes the form of a U-tube mounted on rubber washers beneath a running board. This lower mounting has entailed an improvement in the power and sensitivity of the set itself.

Faked Accidents. What a primrose path is that over which the modern motorist picks his troublous way. Always the dice are loaded him. It is now being revealed in England that quite a considerable amount of money is paid out by insurance companies to people who have made a study and practice of the art of being scientifically knocked down.

In other words, the “victims” of some motor accidents have caused them intentionally and deliberately with the object of obtaining compensation. The “art” of this new profession consists in planning for a slight injury so that the "victim” may survive to draw the money. __ *