Useful Notes for Car Owners

Progress, Volume XI, Issue 2, 1 October 1915, Page 456

Useful Notes for Car Owners

Motoe-Cycle Batteries in War The present Avar in Europe is the first opportunity which motorcycles have had to show their worth as light artillery. A British machine gun

battery is composed of a touring car for the commanding officer, two motorcycles with sidecars, on which Vickers light machine guns are mounted, two reserve machines, which are fitted with all the necessary arrangements to have guns mounted on them, and two sidecars loaded with ammunition. In addition to the six motorcycles, there are usually three large touring cars, loaded with additional ammunition, rifles, provisions and equipment. The battery is accompanied by a lieutenant on a very fast racing motorcycle. Speed It is commonly thought that motor cars are built with either two, three, or ..four speeds; this is an error: they are only built with two, to-wit, the one you go at, and the one that the magistrate says you go at

The Valves The fact that there are some car manufacturers who advertise that, with their products, the engine valves are interchangeable prompts us to point out that under no circumstance should these be changed. The first time the “new chum” motorist tackles the job of grinding in his valves he should be careful to mark each of them in such a way that he can be certain to replace it on its proper seating. Failure to observe this rule, may lead to endless trouble in getting the engine to run properly afterwards. In a four-cylinder engine the eight valves though seemingly alike as eight peas, in reality, are very different. They will vary in length and what is worse, they will not work properly on any but their original seating. Mix them up, unmarked, and it will take hours to get things back to normal.

Australian Steel At the opening of the great steel works, at War at ah (N.S.W.), Mr. Bryde said that information obtained abroad went to show that the company would he well justified in embarking upon the steel industry. Fully £7,000,000 worth of iron and steel (over 400,000 tons) in various forms was imported into the Commonwealth in 1912. The capacity of the new works with one blast furnace was 1,500,000 tons of the manufactured article per annum, and so room for such works was obvious. It had cost close on £1,500,000 to complete the works and develop the sources of the iron and limestone supplies required.