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'WE are indebted to The Motor for some very striking figures relating to the consumption of motor spirit in this country. In 1913 we imported 101,000,000 gallons, whilst last year this increased to over 954,000,000 gallons, but something like 46,000,000 gallons were re-exported. Some was used for industrial purposes, but the bulk of the increase is due to the great growth in road transport and aviation.
PUBLIC statues made from rubber appear to be a practicable possibility of the future as a result of tests carried out by the Dunlop technical staff for the memorial tablet to the late J. B. Dunlop, which was recently unveiled in Belfast. The memorial was made from a solid block of ebonite, or hard rubber, weighing 270 lb., of which 70 lb. c1.8 was removed by the sculptor in clippings and shavings. T h e block was built up from layers of unvulcanized ebonite compressed under a roller weighing 5 cwt. and trimmed to fit a special steel mould in which it was under 250' tons pressure and " cooked" for 110 hours.
AT the present time, with the
surfeit of new legislation, the transport man has no light task before him. It is, however, made all the harder by reason of the matter served up to him by the lay Press. No sooner does a draft regulation become known than the usual stunt headlines appear, making the draft rules read as though they were actually law. Our daily correspondence shows the state of confusion which this habit of sensation mongering has created among a certain number of vehicle users. The best advice we can give is to watch The Commercial Motor. New regulations will be given as they become law ; draft regulations will be criticized as such. Between a draft and an actual law there may be great differences.
THE verbatim report of the Reo sales conference of overseas distributors, held last August by the Reo Motor Car Co., at its works in Lansing, Michigan, U.S.A., has just reached us. It runs to 181 pages and includes addresses by the various representatives and others on all phases of the Reo sales organization. This remarkable gathering of nearly 40 distributors from all parts of the world was organized by means of sales competitions, the winning dealers being invited to Lansing. It strikes one as an excellent way of creating a world-wide bond between the distributors of one make of vehicle and the Reo company is to be congratulated on its enterprise. IN the latest Karrier Gazette Mr. R. Dean-Averns, A.M.I.A.E., chief engineer, of Karrier Motors, Ltd., contributes an informative article on six-wheelers, in the course of which he utters a warning with regard to tyre pressures. He points out that any marked deviation in pressure affects the running radius of the tyre, thus seriously disturbing the functioning of the differential.
He quotes a case in which the owner of a sixwheeler complained of differential failure. Upon examination it was found that the Whole bogie was unsatisfactory and, as no internal reasons for the trouble were revealed, replacement parts were fitted. When the time came to refit the road wheels the erector complained that one wheel was missing and it subsequently transpired that the owner had for, weeks been running with a spare wheel from another vehicle having 34-in. by 7-in. tyres, whereas the Other three were of 36-in. by 8-in. dimensions. This fact was the sole cause of the trouble,