The Relationship of User and Manufacturer
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By John B. Walton (Lever Bros. and Unilever Ltd.) WJE have amongst transport users the "cream "of W operating management and technical ability to run commercial road transport. The operator, that is, the manager of transport, has his own ideas as to what would be ideal from his point of view, and he transmits them, albeit somewhat inarticulately, to the engineering side of the business—this should be done and that shoulhi not be done, he wants something which is definitely better—and there he comes to a full stop.
Can we look farther ahead? The C.M.U.A., A.R.O., and ,other operators' organizations, seem to be so pressed with local considerations and arguments about rates and status, that the van, as a physical entity, seems to have been completely 'lost sight of. The S.IVI:M.T. is a manufacturers' organization, and the manufacturers' duty to their shareholders is, primarily, to earn profits. They are not primarily concerned with either you or me as an operator of transport. The J.A.E.—a somewhat remote and austere body—appears more concerned with the fitness of any individual part and the general assembly of a chassis, than that the chassis itself should be suitable for the operator who has to earn his living from its performance.
The users of transport, as such, have no adequate technical representation in any of the organizations to improve their operating ability and, from a national point of view, to extract the utmost economy from such facilities as they have for delivering goods to the public.
We are faced, if we analyse things, with the fact that if we revert to 'statistics of 1924, we find, in the petrol vehicle alone, breakdowns due to ignition were some 22-23 per cent. We still find, in 1941, by the same cross-section exemplified by these statistics, that breakdowns due to ignition remain at the same percentage. We find, also, however you analyse the results, that the component parts of a chassis, in respect of their relative breakdowns, are much the same over a period of 20 years.
The thermaleificieney of the I.C. engine, as exemplified in our vehicle chassis, has scarcely moved. Admittedly, the metallurgical reliability of the prime mover is better than it was, but we still pour most of the petrol away, either down the exhaust pipe or into the radiator. We see and hear wonderful tales of the superiority of this vehicle over that; of the excellence of this gearbox or that back axle. Yet, if we lift the bonnet and remove the bogy we find that all these chassis are practically identical and, in many cases, to such an extent that even the components are interchangeable one with another.' For instance, I cite the case of the gears on the chassis of four intensely competitive cohcerns, which interchange one with the other on the equivalent models—one of them even is American. We find also that a much-advertised a.nd publicized manufacturer in the Midlands has his gearboxes made for .him by a competitor in the South in England.
The'rnanufacturer has made very little progress, and we,
the operators, seem to be paying a very heavy subsidy for his "fun and games " in the Way of competition. But yet, we are not either sufficiently articulate to say that we will have this or that done, or even strong enough to put forward our own considered views on transport-vehicle design. In other words, the manufacturer is very resistant to anybody who presumes to teach him what he thinks in his business, yet any reasonably sized operator knows far more -about the good and bad points and performance of a vehicle than any manufacturer can ever possibly do. I feel that the time is now ripe when some definite step forward should be taken, so that the operator can be articulate in voicing his considered technical and operative opinion to the manufacturer. The time is ripe for approach to the Institution of Automobile Engineers. The interest of that body lies, from a national point of view at any rate, more with the user of the vehicle than with the manufacturer. Its function, amongst others, should he to postulate , those components which -will go, not only to make a vehicle which is ideal from the operator's point of view, but one
which will be a selling proposition abroad. As most operators' problems, problems are the same the world over,, the vehicle which is a good one here should be a good one abroad. ,
When this war is over, we shall undoubtedly have to take steps to revise very carefully our attitude towards post-war development and marketing. Whatever we may do to Germany, it is a'country of 80,000,000 people who are very ingenious. In ,foreseeing and developing possibilities. Their foresight in the early' development of oil engines resulted in their being able to market these engines at prices very little in excess of those of petrol units. Oil engines should be available to us all, as they would be if they came within a reasonable price limit and not one out of all proportion to what the' are worth.
We must bear in mind, too, the possibility that LendLease will wash out tariff barriers between America and this country and then, taking a look at present-day American vehicles and having some idea of their line of development, we shall find, unless big and poWerful steps be taken, a very, serious competitor to any British manufacturer, both in the home market and abroad, I feel sure that unless there be instituted some proper representation between the user and the manufacturer, a very large body of users will feel at liberty, post-war, to buy vehicles which suit their needs wherever these may be found. Whether it rests with the British maker or the foreign manufacturer to Supply, or, in the caSe of very large users, for them to set up their own assembly 'plants for such vehicles as they may require, is for the British maker to decide: