THE MOTOR WORLD

Wairarapa Daily Times, 11 December 1925, Page 2

THE MOTOR WORLD

As told to a Traffic Coir. In New York motor cycle mounted police are used to check spooning motorists. An interview with one or these men in the Yew. York Times quotes some amusing excuses o tie red. by offenders, from which wc extract the following:— l “Each time I catch lip to a speeding car and wave it to the kerb I wonder what kind of a yarn I’m going to hear. I’ve made a sort of collection of the stories that have been forced on me, and I’m always uii the lookout for new ones. “For the first two or three years on this job I would drink in every word before filling out the .summons, but now I’ve learned how to listen and write at the same time. Asking a driver for his Jicense> is like requesting a bedtime story. The card comes slowly, but the yarn conns fast. “I used to like the one in which the speeder had just had the engine completely overhauled and had four. I that the car moved thirty miles an hour with the same pressure oil the accelerator that had hardly yielded fifteen in tiie past. The yarn about the new shoes through which the driver hadn’t vet got the feel of tiro gas pedal was another favourite. The- fellow who had recently received a rise in pay and just couldn’t make his feet behave was entertaining.

“J.t, has been some months* since T met the la sit man who was so overjoyed because his wife had presented him with a bubv boy that he really could not be expected to move along at less than fifteen miles an hour. 1 let two or three of them get by with that yarn, but -when I hear it now I am likely to hand out a ticket for reckless uriving as well as for speeding. “You see, I once took down the address of one of these new fathers and made a. little investigation. After my tour of duty I went to the house. 1 rang the bell and a woman came to the door. I mentioned the name, of the man I was inquiring for, and the woman said that- she was 1 his wife. I got all flustered and finally managed to remark what a nice thing it was for her to present her husband with a beautiful babv bov.

“She looked at me funny like and said I was rather late with the congratulations, as the boy had been presented to her husband nine years before, and was in the back of the house playing cowboys and Indians with some of the neighbour children.” - * * * Tyres and Speed. A test was recently conducted on the Brooldands Racing Track (England) with the object of ascertaining whether a motor cycle sidecar outfit was faster shod with standard high pressure cord tyres or with balloon tyres fitted. With balloon tyres of 13.58 inch section, the outfit gave a mean speed of 150.86 m.p.li. These, tyres were then taken off and !3in standard type fitted, and the mean time recorded under exactly the same conditions as the first test, was 48.16, a difference of over two miles per hour in favour of the balloon tyres. The. pressures employed were 201 b per square inch on the front wheel and 251 b on the rear when fitted with balloons, and .‘3slb and 451 b respectively with the ordinary tyres fitted. The sidecar tyre was unchanged. This result will occasion considerable interest to many motor cyclists. An English expert supplies the following explanation: ‘‘On a perfect surface hard-blown tyres would doubtless have the advantage, but Broolkands is not at all like a billiard table (it is recorded that one of the earlier runs had to be abandoned because a big bump jerked the arm of the observer seated in the sidecar so violently that he inadvertently stopped the watch). Vibration has a very serious retarding influence on a motor cycle, and when a side-car is attached it is worse. Anyone who has come suddenly upon a piece of very pot-holey road after running fast over a good surface knows this. Some speed is lost owing to. wheel spin due to bouncing, but a machine is retarded more by encountering such a road as I have described than if the clutch wore released and the engine cut out while the road remained good. I mean that one notices a more sudden lessening of speed, of course, in the latter case the machine would presently stop, but not in the former. The friction in a tyre, depends upon the thickness of the r\alls and the amount of bending; also upon the construction but this may be the same in each case. In one respect, therefore, a low pressure tyre lias the advantage with its thin wall, and in the other respect the ordinary tyre will score. The total weight must also have a certain influence. * « a s Cars for 1926.

More efficient mul still cheaper cars' are. assured for 1926, but as yet there is no evidence that any radical change in design is projected bv famous factories. Already the policies of British designers are known, and new models are being distributed. Some American factories have also launched their 1926 models. Primarily 192(5 will 'be marked by the almost universal adoption of four-wheel brakes and balloon tyres. Many improved types of front wheel brakes have made their appearance. the latest variety employs three internal expanding shoes in place, of the customary pair. By using triplicate shoes, the whole circumference of the drum is submitted to more even braking clfeet and wear. The servo-motor, a device for supplying the ''Anal power to bring

Notes of Interest.

Hu' brake into operation, is also achieving wider popularity. With the heaviest- ears the lightest touch on the pedal causes the servo-motor to apply a powerful leverage to the brakes.,, Balloon tyres for 1926 have -undergone a change. They are being made in smaller and stronger sections, and are more like an oversize tyre run at a low pressure. Shock-absorbers have increased in types and popularity, owing to the peculiar demands of low-pressure tyres. Also many cars have redesigned steering gears owing to the necessity for increased leverage for balloon tyres'. Air cleaners and oil purifiers arc featured on many new cars. The first device prevents dust from being drawn through the carburetter, thus reducing carbon deposits and oil contamination. The air cleaner is in effect- a filter. The oil purifier is more complicated. A certain quantity of the engine oil is drawn into a reservoir for treatment. if filtered and heated in order to drive off the petrol with which it has probably been diluted through piston leakage. The clean .nil then passes into circulation, and a new supply is drawn into the purifier.

■Several well-known cars have been fitted with harmonic crankshaft balancers for 1926. Its object is to reduce vibration and period, and to compensate for -unbalanced forces set up by the reciprocating parts. * * * » Sparks. Au invention which, he says, will Hush .and test the storage battery right from the cowl-board without inconvenience to the operator, is announced by I. 11. Solomon, of San Francisco. Automobile number plates for 1926, for the State of Maryland, U.S.A., will bo made by convicts in the State penitentiary. The order calls for 260,000 sets with white- figures on a black enamelled background. 'The use of exhaust cut-outs by motor cyclist formed the subject of a complaint received at the last meeting of the -Hamilton branch of the A.A.A. Since there is a legal remedy against the practice, the. association resolved to take no action. An old tip, which does not lose in value by repetition, is to carry spare split pins, washers, nuts and similar oddments likely to be required on a piece of wire, so that they may be easily found when wanted. The wire itself may be useful. According to Mr. Dummett, a Greenwich magistrate, 7'5 per cent, of road accidents are due to cutting in, and the man who pulled out without seeing if the road was clear was a “dangerous criminal.” According to a- statement emanating from the British Ministry of Labour, ] 96,000 persons were employed in the construction and repair of motor cycles, pedal cycles, aircraft, and motor cars in England in July, 1923. By July, 1924, the number of persons employed had risen to 201,800. It’s probably a good thing, all angles considered, that the development of the automobile and the spread of prohibition have gone in hand (says an American paper). The motor car may beat old Bobbin ‘in getting there in the shortest time, but even the most advanced models can’t be depended upon to come home safely from a '2 a.m. lodge meeting with the driver fast asleep and the reins wrapped around the whip socket. An ellieient-looking device for direc-tion-indicating was demonstrated to the Mayor and city councillors of ■Christchurch the other evening by the inventor, Mr. K. M. P. Murray, of Christchurch. The device consists of two red lights in the front and two green light in the rear. Instead of putting the hand out to indicate the turning of a corner, the driver switches on the lights on either the- left side or the right. This saves extending the arm, a difficult feat in a closed car. The market day was wearing late when Tam emerged somewhat unsteadily from the inn door, cranked up his car, and, slightly over-shooting the mark, planted himself solemnly in the back ’ seat. The watchful village policeman approached him and said in kindly tones: “Xoo, Tammas, ye’ll need to come oot of that; ye’re nae fit to drive.” “Mind your ain business,” was the rejoined. And then in magisterial tones Tammas proceeded, “It would suit ye better to catch the chid thats stolen my driving wheel.”