LUXURIOUS HUNTING CARS.

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXV, Issue 18512, 8 March 1930, Page 13 (Supplement)

LUXURIOUS HUNTING CARS.

Thousands of pounds are spent every year in Britain by Indian princes and rajahs on luxuriously fitted special hunting motor-cars in which the occupants can take meals and even sleep. Two of these hunting cars have been shipped to the Jam Sahib of Nawanagar, better known as Prince Ran jitsinhji, the famous cricketer,‘and another has just been sent to the King of Uganda. Britain’s reputation for mechanical reliability and for special coachwork designs caused one or two wealthy sportsmen of the East to order cars suitable for travelling in the jungle. This was found to be such an improvement on the discomfort of the safari that now nearly every potentate prince and maharajah owns his hunting car, which is almost as a matter of course ordered from Britain. The personal tastes of the owner are always embodied in the design and wonderful colour schemes are ordered, such as sea green and cream, scarlet, silver and lemon yellow. Sometimes all the interior fittings, including the steering wheel and gear lever, are made of ivory, sometimes of fine inlaid wood. Probably the most striking exterior feature of a hunting car is the number of lamps. In the jungle the car is a mobile blaze of light. Very powerful lamps are fitted at each side of the body and in the centre is a searchlight, which can be raised or lowered on a sliding pillar. These three lamps can be directed to any desired point by a swivelling action. Special clips on the back of the front seats hold rifles ready to hand whenever a wild animal is picked out by the blinding glare from the lights. A hunting trip often means a lengthy journey and, perhaps, several camps en route. The car has therefore to be fitted with compartments on each side of the body holding two sliding drawers for baggage and on the luggage grill at the rear is a trunk holding two large ice chests. In these food can be carried for almost any length of time in the hottest climates. A cabinet for small stores its fitted at the back of the front seat on which are attached folding glass-topped tables. On a long trip a closed car, containing bath with water laid on from a tank and a dressing-room or sleeping bunks, sometimes forms part of the expedition. Although cars are now regarded as almost indispensable for big game hunting in India it is, however, still necessary to hunt on foot in the denser parts of the jungle.

NORMAN SMITHS TYRES. During its appearance on the Ninety Mile Beach, the 500 h.p. Rolls-Royce-Cadillac car in which Mr Norman “Wizard” Smith established a new world’s record for 10 miles, and raised the Australian and New Zealand mile record, attracted a great deal of attention, and much of this was centred on the tyres. The most striking feature was the total absence of any tread, the tyre being absolutely smooth, without any pattern. The result was that when the car was travelling at its highest speed, it left tracks no wider than those of a racing motorcycle, the whole weight of the car being carried on a strip in the centre of the tyre not two inches wide. The smooth surface of the rubber and the absence of any protuberances prevented any drag on the wet sand, and it was estimated at the time that there was less than 1 per cent, loss of efficiency from this or any other cause. Another striking feature of the tyres, which were specially made in an American factory for the car, was the extreme thinness of the outer layer of rubber, which did not exceed an eighth of an inch. In one or two places on one of the tyres, which was changed before the second record was set up, cuts from shells less than an eighth of an inch deep exposed the fabric. There were ten plies of rubber and fabric, which instead of being woven from cotton fibre, was of twisted silk to withstand the heavy strain which was placed on it. The tyres were designed to be run with pressures of from 85 to 1101 b. to the square inch. When the records were made, the tyres were inflated at a pressure 'nearer the lower end of the range of pressures under which they would run satisfactorily.

COURTEOUS ACTION BY HOLLAND The bit of Holland which is now for ever Czecho-Slovakia deserves a place fn the record of international agreements in 1820. Commenius, the Bohemian teacher-hero, died in 1670 at Amsterdam. Oommenius was buried in the little Gtefchic church of Naarden and over his bon*a the Czecho-Slovak Government exchanged diplomatic notes with the Government of the'Netherlands. The Dutch Government refused to part with Commenius. It did better: it gave the church at Naarden as a present to Czecho -Slovakia I