Cycling & Motor Notes

Otago Witness, Issue 3342, 3 April 1918, Page 44

Cycling & Motor Notes

BY DEMON

shipping difficulties it may be necessary that many automobile equipments for tho new U.S.A. army in France will be manufactured in England. Already the various English tyremakers have been requested to detail the utmost possible extent of their manufacturing capacity, irrespective of their total factory output. Every mould has to be accounted for, and its full capacity of output, working up to its fullest production. It is more than possible that extensions of factories may _be sanctioned. At any rate it sounds feasible that tyres, chassis, and other equipments can bo supplied for the United States army by Great Britain with less inconvenience than from America, and will probably be the consequence of important trade developments. According to the latest returns, some 2000 motor ploughs are now in operation in England, breaking up over 30,000 acres per week. Tho use of these up-to-date tractors will result in about 1,000,000 acres of new country being tilled and put. into use. The war has resulted in a marvellous development in tho manufacture of artificial limbs. They can be made to be almost as useful as tho real article. The French have been especially successful in this direction. The Cauet arms and hands are controlled through Bowden wires, such as are used for bicycle brakes and controls on motor cycles and motor cars. They are operated by movements of the shoulder and lower chest muscles. A fully-equipped hand and forearm weighs only lilb. By means of these Bowdenised limbs it is possible for a man with two artificial arms to handle a car or motor cycle safely. This is certainly a wonderful development. The Automobile Association of Great Britain is desirous of developing the use of coal gas among motorists generally, and to this end the Executive Committee of that body has decided to offer a prize of £IOOO for the best invention which will enable coal gas to be used with advantage as a propeilant of motor cars and motor cycles. —— The first motor cycle •is said to have been made by Herr Daimler, whose firm has recently been placed under German military supervision owing to profiteering and falsification of their books. Daimler is said to have made his motor cycle as far back at 1885. It was fitted with a small single-cylinder engine, and the charge was ignited by means of tube ignition. Supports were embodied, with rollers at 'the ends, to enable the machine to stand alone and to allow the rider to mount easily after the engine had been started.

Amerioan manufacturers are seizing every opportunity to drive home the virtues of the electric car, and contemporaneously are leaving no stone unturned 'to remove many of the delusions generally cherished concerning the so-called shortcomings of this vehicle. This is particularly noticeable in connection with the socalled unsuitability of the electric for shortdistance touring trips. _ A few weeks ago a small electric car with two passengers up—one acting .as observer —started off from New York City bound for Atlantic City, over a distance of 123 miles of very £ indifferent roads. On the outward run the pace was easy, the journey being completed in about eight hours—an average of approximately 15 miles an hour. On the return trip it was decided to pit the vehicle against the clock, and the 123 miles were reeled off in two minutes under six hours' running time. Only one stop was made of 90 minutes' duration, during which period the battery was given a charge. The average speed worked out at 20i miles an hour, the car running for the whole time on the fifth and sixth speeds. But the most astonishing feature was the low cost of running. The current consumed on the 123 miles cost less than half what would have been incurred had petrol been used. In certain quarters there is a disposition to regard the electric as the rival to the petrol car. This is a grievous mistake. The fields of application of the two vehicles are so well ~ defined and extensive as to leave plenty of space for the adequate development of either. The electric will not rival its petrol consort for general touring; it is essentially limited to inter-urban, city, and runabout duties over relatively short distances. Of course, as the facilities for re-charging and improvements in the capacity of the batteries are achieved, the radius of action will extend; but this will only have the effect of causing the petrol vehicle to be exploited in fields which as yet it has scarcely entered. The Liberty aeroplane engine, adopted as standard by the American army, consists of a 12-cylinder (sin x 7in) unit, giving off 400 horse-power. It is a particularly light engine for its power, weighing only 8001 b, or 21b per horse-power—the lightest aviation power unit made. Thousands of these engines are now being made in the States, most of the big automobile plants making tho various parts, which are interchangeable. The cruising radius of an aeroplane fitted with the Liberty engine is easily 600 miles. ——Tho proper inflation of cycle tyros is a matter which scarcely receives sufficient attention from the majority of cyclists. Many wheelmen keep their tyres much too flabby, while others pump them as hard and lifeless as any solid. The front tyre should always be softer than the rear one, as the latter has all the weight of the rider to support. _ Both tyres,,, however, should havo a certain amount of " give," which can bo ascertained by gripping the tyro in the hand, and pressing it with the fingers. The tyros should be sufficiently soft to allow of the slightest indentation. The weightier the rider, of course, the harder should .the tyre be pumped; and in wet weather it is safer to err on 'this side, as a flabby tyre would be more liable to side-slip. An Am3rican writer expresses the opinion that a deal of tho trouble that led to the bicycle slump in lhat country was high gearing. The craze for high gears naturally meant harder work, and in_ time less zest for cycling. The same applies to this country. Many a rider starts off with his 80in or 88in gear, and never really appreciates how easy a 60in or 64in gear is to push in comparison. Ho finds cycling hard work, and unless he uses the machine for utility purposes is iikoly In time to give

up his wheel. In this connection the trade ehould use its influence to get cyclists back on to the " sixty " gears again, and crood will accrue to the pastime and the tradc° alike. It is noteworthy that the stock gears of most of the bicycles made in Europe is in the region of 60in ; in Australasia, with its comparaively inferior roads, the average gear is well over 70in—much too high for the good of cycling. ."Writing in the Philadelphia Public Ledger of what he saw at the front,. Mr J F. Marcossan says: "When couriers are needed the motor cyclist is used. These messengers, I might add, constitute one of the most daring and unsung adjuncts of the war. Day and night I have seen them rattling along the roads of France at what was literally break-neck speed. In wet and dry, sleet and slush, heat and cold, these men keep to their path. I have often marvelled how they managed to do it, and also how they managed to get away with their lives. Not all of them do, because scores of them have been killed, cither by colliding with heavy motor trucks in the dark, or by skidding off the road into trees and fences. These are the men who helo to keep Haig supplied with certain information, and who sometimes transmit his orders straight to the front when the telephone wires are shot away." One of the biggest factors in the military development- of the present war is the motor vehicle. So much has been said regarding this that it is only necessary to mention the motor vehicles that saved Paris in the fall of 1914, when the 4000 trucks and cars in an endless sion 30 miles long made possible the successeful defence of the line at Verdun. The crushing of the Hindenburg line before Cambrai was made possible by the power of the tanks. Much of the mobility of the heavy artillery was due wholly to the use of motors. While no definite figures are available, it is certain that there are in the neighbourhood of 120,000 motor vehicles in the war zone, over 50,000 of which have been supplied by the United States. Great as has been this gathering of cars, on the European battle-front it has been made possible only by another angle of mobilisation.

of the motor vehicle. The entire motor car industry of America, including owners as well as makers, is mobilised for war. In the 4,00'0,000 motor cars and trucks registered in the United. States, there is represented a manufacturing capital of close on £200,000,000, and a great proportion of this now has been turned into production of either motor vehicles and their parts of war munitions along similar lines. The growing use of the bicycle in London is revealed by the figures now available for the twelfth annual road traffic census taken in Edgare road. During a period of nine hours—9 a.m. to 6 p.m. (on a certain date chosen each year) 729 pedicycles passed the checkers in 1916, while in 1918 the total had swollen to 1025, or 126 cycles per hour. Pedal cycle-carrier machines were not so numerous last year as in the previous term —108 as against 173,due to the fact that there are fewer youths available for the necessarily heavier labour entailed, and the work is of a nature which hardly could be undertaken by girls or women. 'An accident, which has since been attended with fatal results, occurred on the North road, Invercargill, at 6.5 p.m. on Saturday. The motor traffic was particularly heavy with the cars returning from Pviverton races. It appears (says the Southland Times) that a married man named John Sanders, labourer, of Biggar street, was hindering the traffic between Roope's brewery and the Waihopai bridge by rushing out and trying to step or board the passing cars. After many narrow escapes, he was knocked down by a car going at the rate of four to five miles an hour, and whoso driver was endeavouring to avoid him. It seems that the mudguard struck Sanders's leg, and he, being a big man, fell heavily on his head. < Ho died at 1.30 p.m. on Sunday, it is believed from an injury to the brain. • There were also injuries to the body, arms, and legs. _.—Certain British motor manufacturers are becoming favourably disposed to the cycle car, especially in regard to post-war policies. There certainly is room for the reliable little vehicle, which provides means of motoring for the masses, not merely be-

cause of its low initial cost, but also because it is cheap to maintain and operate. Another point that no doubt is influencing tho makers is the accepted belief that pricos will materially advance owing to tho effects of the war. Until recent years the Bmall two-seater car filled the gap between tho prices of tho ordinary touring motor and tho motor cycle; but now, with advance of the costs in every department of manufacture, the cycle car will take tho placo of the small two-seater in the matter of price.

AN IMPORTANT JUDGMENT. His Honor Mr Justice Chapman gave his reserved decision lately in tho case in which the Wairarapa Automobile Association (on behalf of a member, K. M. Stewart) tested the • validity of the Greytown Borough Council's motor by-law. It was contended by the association that the speed limit in the borough of 12 miles per hour was unreasonable, and very exhaustive evidence was taken in Greytown. His Honor upheld the contention of tho association, declaring the by-law invalid, and allowed the appeal with £6 6s costs. Maunsell appeared for the association, and Mr T. F. Martin, Municipal Association solicitor, for the Borough Council. There was heard at the same time an appeal by the Wellington Automobile Club questioning a similar, by-laW by tho Fctone Borough Council, Mr Myers appearing for tho Automobile Club and Mr Kirk for the council. A similar decision was given in this case. The decisions are of considerable importance, as many other boroughs in New Zealand have similar bylaws.