Cycling and Motor Notes.

Progress, Volume VI, Issue 9, 1 July 1911, Page 720

Cycling and Motor Notes.

Mr. Colin B. King has just completed a 7000 mile touring run in a 30 h.p. Cadillac car, shod with Dunlop tires, journeying from Brisbane, passing through New South Wales to Sydney, over the Blue Mountains to Melbourne, and across the desert to Adelaide and Broken Hill to Cunnamulla, passing within a few miles of the historic spot- on Cooper’s Creek where the Burke and Wills expedition perished of thirst and privation, the only survivor, by a strange coincidence, being a man named “King.” This is the Australian record long distance touring run in the one car with the one set of tires, and is the event of the year in motoring. * * * The probable date r of Australia’s premier road contest, the Dunlop Eoad Race from Warrnambool to Melbourne (165 miles) is Saturday, October 14th, the Dunlop Rubber Co. having applied to the League of Victorian Wheelmen for that date. The Saturday selected — Guineas Day—is a week later than the date upon which the “ Warrnambool” is usually held, the change being made ’ with a view of missing the Plemington Race traffic, thus obviating to a great degree the overcrowding of the road associated with the last few “Warr- . nambool ’ ’ finishes. The conditions of the race will be practically the same as last year, perhaps with an additional rule requiring contestants to wear suitable ' costumes, including stockings, thus doing away with the scanty track racing costumes many of the competitors now foolishly ride in. The prize list—totalling over £2oo—together, with conditions, etc., will be issued at an early date.

*** ‘ . A matter that worries many motorists and intending motorists is the question as to whether it is better to have a single seated body or the ordinary tonneau (i.e., double-seated body) fitted to their cars, irrespective of the wisdom of fittting a light body on a chassis sprung to carry a heavy tonneau. For economical motoring there is no doubt the single-seater—-can be made to carry three people a long way better than the tonneau, the saving in tires alone being very considerable, for it is the lateral strain and the additional weight of the extra passengers and body over the back tires that causes fifty per cent, of the tire troubles met with on the road. Of course, the man with a family wants his four or five-seated car, and would be selfish to fit his car with a single seat, but for the motorist who has on family ties there is no doubt that he will get cheaper and better motoring on a single-seater, with chassis designed for the purpose, * * * Some remarkable figures were recently established on the Brooklands racing track (London), by a freak 2-cylinder Lion-Peugeot,light voiturette (small car). The freakish nature of the engine will be understood when it is stated that the bore of the cylinders was only 80 millimetres, with a stroke of 280 millimetres (over eleven inches). The times recorded were: Plying half mile in 24.245ec.; fifty miles in 39min, 47see.; hundred miles in 89min. 28sec.; and 78 miles in the —remarkable travelling for such a type of car.