THE CONQUERING CAR

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XVII, Issue 218, 29 August 1927, Page 7

THE CONQUERING CAR

THE TRIALS OF A RECORD BREAKER.

We have it on the highest authority—that of Holy Writ—that “by their deeds ye shall know them.” And in this era of speed, of recon) making and record-breaking on land and in the air the word of the Book of books applies equally to m?n. the machines and the products that help them achieve their remarkable accomplishments. Every week or so lately we have read of some intrepid motorist who has clipped half a day off somebody’s “time for the dis tanoe,” or some courageous flier who. by establishing a new and amazing record, has startled the world. The latest inter-state record-break-ers are—Messrs. J. M. Thomson and H. Clutterbuck, who reached Adelaide from Perth on Friday the 22nd July after an 1,800 mile dash through heavy thunderstorms and fogs in a Chrysler 70 motor car. They covered the distance in three days forty-two minutes—a splendid achievement which broke the record of three days thirteen hours three minutes held by J. L. Burton since Feburary, 1924. The achievement of these two drivers of the Chrysler is the more notable as the record of Mr. Burton in a Studebaker was acknowledged to be a remarkable performance and had remained unbroken tor over three yearsFollowing upon his Fremantle to Adelaide trip Mr Burton established two more records on the same run which still stand—that of Perth to Melbourne in four days twenty-one hours forty-five minutes, and Perth to Sydney in five days twenty-one hours forty-five minutes.

Only two attempts have been made to establish records on the long liazardous journey from Darwin to Melbourne. The record is held by Mr. A. J. Dunkerley and Mr. Reg. Minion who arrived at the G.P.O. Melbourne a week or two ago, dog tired and exhausted, but proud of the fact that they had done the trip from Darwin—3,3Bo miles—in seven days sixteen hours forty-four min utee.

The man who can drive a car or the man whose motor trips have taken him along well-defined roads for a few score miles outside the capital cities, can have little conception of the tremendous physical strain and nerve-racking, soul-deadening wear and tear on such a journey as that accomplished bv Dunkerley and Miniod. Asked to describe his journey Mr Dunkerley gave some vivid wordpictures of the sort of trials that the overland recofd-breaker must surmount if his trip is to be crowned with success. He said:

“We drove twenty-four hours per day and in the seven days’ driving had only ten square mealsOur only stops were for Plume and Mobiloil laid down for us by the Vacuum Oil Company Ptd., Ltd. Night driving hour after hour, with sleep making an ever-increasing demand upon us. the weirdest hallucinations were produced by the mesmeric influence of the headlights playing on the road ahead. Not once, but many times did we pull up dead because on the road ahead, fancy, in the semi-dream state in we drove mile after mile, had pictured sometimes obstructions, and at other times pedestrians walking across the road ahead of us The hardest part of the trip was from Darwin to Katherine—2l4 miles, which was done non-stop. The route here is an endless repetition of spinifex, mulgs. gums, males, wash-outs (six and seven feet deep), boulders, grass (ten feet high), stony ridges, sandy crossings, blaxing hot sun and no roads. Driving is done by general direction. “The route throughout Queensland took us through many stations and it is hard to refuse hospitality, but it can’t be done when a record keeps us rigily to a time-able and to fall asleep would be disastrous. “Passing through the cattle •country many skeletons of droughtstricken cattle were seen. Another irksome trouble by no means the bwst. was the interminable gate

opening through the cattle country. Between Longreach and the border of Queensland and New South Wales I counted opening 142 gates and then got tired of counting them as that seemed but to increase the monotony. “A curious phenomenon observed at practically every first gate out of a town was the number ot ‘deadmarines' lying near the gate. The halt to open the gate evidently presented a welcome opportunity invariably availed of by travellers. “A wide range of temperature was passed through—from 85 degrees at Darwin to below zero between Sydney and Melbourne, where the water-bag was frozen into a solid lump of ice, and the splashes from the road puddle froze in sheets of ice on the side of the car. “Only two untoward, incidents happened of any consequence. Early in the trip we had an oil pipe brushed off the sump when crashing through some saplings, and at Dajarra, oh the border, we hurtled over a 15ft cliff-at forty miles an hour, fortunately landing in such a way that the car suffered no apparent damage. The mechanic Mr. Minion, was so deep in sleep that even this drop and sudden stop did not wake him.”

Yet it is to these wonderful record breakers nnd their feats of almost super-human endurance that we are indebted for assisting in the opening up and pioneering the back blocks of the Continent. OTHER INTERESTING RECORDS Other motoring records of interest are:— Sydney to Melbourne, 566 miles, in 12 hours 34 minutes.—Accomplished by Mr. A. V. Turner in February, 1924, in an ‘Ttala’’ car. Adelaide to Melbourne, 580 miles, in 12 hours 10 minutes.—Accomplished by Mr. A. 11. Barnes in a Th. Schneider, April, 1925. Brisbane th Sydney, 643 miles, in 16 hours 5 minutes—Accomplished by “Wizard” Smith in a Chrysler car on the 9th December. 1926. A unique feature of all the records broken or unbroken, mentioned in this article is the fact that they have been achieved on Plume Motor Spirit and. with one exception Gargoyle Mobiloil. In the days of the chariot the Romans had a saying—“Festina I^nte”—hasten slowly. Nowadays, the prevailing motto seems to be—- “ Step on the gas and let her go.”