T The Commercial Motor Show in October. -'. HE VEXED QUESTION,
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to show or not to show, has been settled by the Society of Motor . Manufacturers and Traders, the council having decided to organize a commercial vehicle ekhibitiOn , at Olympia in October next, The" decision, despite the arguments advanced by some of the leading manufacturers, is a wise one, aimed at securing the greatest goorl for the greatest number. It has always been the experience in every industry that an exhibition of trade wares is an incentive to manufacturers and a creator of business, and a little common-sense, coupled with observation, a knowledge of human nature and some small amount oljutigment, must point to that conclusion, so that any set opposition to exhibitions can only result from narrow-mindedness, a certain mea,sere of conservatism and s.elf-satiSfaction. coupled, however, in some eases, with a .fear of ecempetition. The British manufacturer (not. alone in the motor industry, let it be stated) is apt to be accretive about his methods : he is afraid to give his competitors points and wrinkles, afraid to do anything to help them along. The right way is shown by our transatlantic rivals, who throw 'their . works and their 7nethod8 open to all miners, realizing that the hettel!. the service which an industry, as a whole, can give to its customers the greater will be the volume of buying, in the advantages arising from -which all must share. British manufacturers are learning and improving, however, and, as the trade of the country and its foreign markets expand, the force of the argument in favour of developing an industry for the good of the industry as a whole must have increasingly .beneficial effects.
; We.,belieVe in shows.; we believe that they make • custoiners ; we Are -convinced that they are good propaganda... We listen to the grumble of the established manufacturer about the expense and the disturbance of output, .and to, the assertion that orders are lost a's Well as gained at a show, and we go away convinced that this self-same manufacturer will urge his draughtsmen to put forth their best efforts and the Works to turn out the best productions, in order that, at the show, the exhibited vehicles will. be as good as anything on show—even better. In that way progress lies.
The equally vexed question as. to the most suitable time of the year for a commercial vehicle show, however, %till_ remains to be .settled, a much earlier period than October being generally favoured.
FreightExchange Organization.
THE ORGANIZATION of freight .exchanges is extremely slow in its development, and an examination of many 'schemes that have, from time to time, been submitted to us has not made us.. feel at all optimistic about the possibilities of the isolated exchange. Dozens of amateur organizers, fresh from the Army and the Royal Air Force, where transport has been organized under strict disciplinary • rules and with no question of profit and loss, have shown us their plans for establishing freight exchanges, but, without pouring 'coIel water upon them, or attempting unduly to quench enthusiasm, we have had to confess (to ourselves!) that none of the plans offered much evidence of real knowledge of the difficulties, or even of the needs of the situation, and we are not surprised to find. that none of the schemes• has, so far, eventuated. • . He is an exceptional man who can -Make a successof a freight exchange. He must be a born canvasser —a man -who can seek out business day after day, always building up and yet never getting his building finished, creating acertain amount of goodwill, but needing always to be at work to keep it. He must know' the ways and methods of the trades and industries of the area in -Which he is working, -so that, whenever and wherever he has an empty vehicle, he will be able, as it were, to divine the existence of the suitable load at the right time and place. He must, in fact, be quite a trade encycloptedia. There have been a few successful freight exchanges, and we have Always found that, in each case, there is a strong personality at the head, in whom the success of the particular exchange is centred.
We think that there is much to be done by a central body, representative of owners of fleets, large and small, which shall absorb the successful freight exchanges, 'and can put-in charge of the business a whole-time man with some sound experience, who Shall examine the various methods employed and apply them in founding other exchanges in different centres, co-ordinating the whole.
The business must be run by and for those who have the greatest interest in any such scheme---the owners of transport, for without their whole-hearted co-operation it can only succeed with difficulty..
There is work here for a big-salaried man, and we believe that the outcome of his efforts will be to bring to motor road transport a large'raeasure of the longer haulage business, which, at present, it loses to the railways because of inefficient organization.
The Illogical Fear of Increased Production.
DURING AN INTERVIEW recentljrgiven, Mr. J, T. Brownlie, chairman of the executive council of the Amalgamated Society of Engineers, was asked why so many of his members opposed the continuance of the premium bonus system, and his reply wag "the fear that increased production will cause unemployment."
• On the same day that this interview was given, the Prime Minister was speaking in the House of Commons on a suggestion favouring a drastic reduction on the importation of luxuries. He pointed out that, as matters stand at the moment, the Government has not the power to prohibit imports of any kind. Also, he expressed the opinion that such prohibition would not correct the rate of exchange between Great Britain and America and that "the real remedy for the present position is the rapid increase of production bath for home requirements and for export."
We ..have, therefore, two diametrically-opposed opinions. The Government points to increased production as the only road to salvation, while very many so-called workers refuse to increase .production for fear that they will over-produce and cause unemployment.. It does not seem to occur to them that under-production must certainly have this very result, -unless we refuse to import not only luxuries but even articles of general utility, compelling our own people at any cost to be dependent upon the home product.
We certainly advocate, at least, the temporary protection of our essential industries against free and unlimited foreign competition, but the very men who refuse to produce in sufficient quantities also refuse to consider favourably any proposal to tax imports. It seems extraordinary that their leaders cannot get them to see where this dual policy must lead them.
Intentional limitation of output inevitably means quite unnecessarily high prices. So long as the workers in other countries adoPt a more sane policy, the products of other countries, unless their importa-tion is heavily taxed, 111t1St have obvious advantages in all markets, including our own, on the score of price. It is quite clear that a point must presently be reached, at which limitation of output leads to such a serious falling off of business that employment instead of being assured, is certainly lost.
If a man refused to work on terms which make his employment a paying proposition to his employer— whether that employer be an individual, a company, or the State—it cannot be long before that man will find himself unemployed.
Meanwhile, he may hold meetings to protest against the high cost of living, the high cost of transport, and so on, but, until he gets to work to produce an output sufficient in quantity and sufficiently attractive in price to appeal to the world's markets, all his protests must necessarily be in vain, and. he, together with all the other members of the community, must find his position growing steadily worse rather than, better.
The Overcrowding of Buses.
ANY PUBLICSERVICE system which fails to prOvide seating accommodation for all its paying passengers is evidently inadequate. At the present moment the inadequacy of our local railway, tramway and motor omnibus services in London and elsewhere is an undeniable fact.
So far as motorbuses are concerned, this fact received tangible recognition in the permission granted during the war, presumably as a temporary measure, for a certain number of standing passengers to be carried in the interior of buses. If strap-hanging iS to be recognized in tram and tuUe railways, it would be inequitable to prohibit it in omnibuses, since, in all eases alike, an increase in the number of passengers that can be carried must mean some decrease in the operating costs per passenger-mile, and these c12 costs cannot he fairly compared if the one system is penalized by restrictions which do not apply to the others.
Strap-hanging, as a permanent practice, is bad for both the temper and for the health of the community. It is altogether wrong that people, at the end of a long day's work, should b,e required to stand on a jolting floor all the way home. Our aim, therefore, should obviously be to provide enough seats for all, bat, until this object can be attained, the strap-hanging nuisance must be tolerated. ' It is, however, very questionable whether it is right to permit any passengers to stand while there still remain seats available for occupation. Under the present system, in wet weather, there may be plenty of vacant seats on the top of an omnibus and several people standing inside it Even in these days of extended suffrage, most men feel that some courtesy is due to the opposite sex. Tfiey also feel that, if a shower comes on after they have entered an omnibus, the result of this courtesy must be, either that they will have to stand up, or that they will have to sit on wet seats on the upper deck. Neither possibility is pleasant, and, consequently, many men, who would habitually use buses if no ,
strap-hanging wore permitted, are disinclined to do so in present circumstances.
The man, as an individual, cannot very well inform the lady who enters an omnibus that there is plenty of room for her in the rain on the top deck. The general organization responsible is, however, more impersonal and can, therefore, treat the proposition differently, and there appears to be no reason whatever why strap-hanging should continue to be permitted in omnibuses on which any seats, exposed or otherwise, are vacant.
Before it was permitted, if the interior of the bus was fall, a would-be passenger had the choice between an exposed seater nothing. , There is no logical reason why this choice should be extended since the purpose of permitting strap-hanging is simply to increase the total carzying capacity of the vehicle, and this it does not do until all the seats are filled. Moreover, there are plenty of people who will now enter a bra, even if the weather is not disagreeable, merely because they happen to prefer the inside to the out, and they know that politeness will force some unfortunate individual to vacate his seat in their favour.
To Scrap or to Repair.
IN THE ECONOMICS of transport maintenance, there are many factors in regard to which it is difficult to lay down hard and fast principles. Particularly is this the ease in connection with repair work. Time and again there arises, during the process of repairing a. vehicle, a question as to. whether it is better to scrap a worn or damaged part and to replace it by a newone, or to attempt, by repair or some form of improvisation, to make the old part do.
When such a doubt arises, .there are always two factors which must be borne in mind. The first is that of mechanical fitness, and the second is that of comparative cost.
So far as the mechanical aspect of the question is concerned, this must always he dependent largely upon the resource, experience and judgment of the engineer upon. whom the decision rests. The repair " sense " is not taassessed by every engineer. ,It is a. form of ingenuity none too common in this country. Whilo there may be much latent talent in this direction, the proximity of factories and the accessibility of up-to-date equipment do not tend to bring it into light. The Colonial or the soldier-engineer in a widespread campaign is, perforce, compelled to resort to mechahical ingenuity to a much greater extent, in order to overcome the disadvantages under which he has to work. Under such conditions, cost is a, secondary consideration. The engineer does not ask humself: "Will it cost more to repair this part than to scrap it and buy a new one?" He says: "I must make this old part serviceable again, because I do not know if I an get a new one to replace it."
Now. while it is a fact that, during the war, many ingenious " stunts" were evolved for keeping vehicles upon the road, and much was learned that should be useful in commercial operation, there was a certain limitation invariably imposed. It was that standardization had to be maintained. To enable vehicles successfully to operate on the stupendous war-time acale it was imperative that the processes of repair shod(' interfere with standardization as little as possible, otherwise the transport system would have broken down.
Thus it was that the use of the oversize part had very largely to be curtailed, and, where it was permitted, to be limited, syetematized and controlled as much as possible. Because uniformity had to be maintained, the engineer's resource could not be given full scope. But, under commercial conditions, such considerations are not so vital. Unless a. fleet of vehicles be very large, it is not so essential to maintain the standardization of each and every part. That being so, is sufficient Attention given in the economics of repair, to the possibility of using oversize parts? Take cylinders and pistons, for instance. As was discovered by force of circumstances in the war, some makers' cylinders will stand regrinding time and again. It is only a matter of fitting oversize,pistons to make an expensive cylinder block last almost an interminable period.
There is real economy in that. Whatever the cost of replacement parts may be, there is no question of the saving to be made. Similarly, this argument may be applied to many other parts. The amount of wear in most instances is insufficient to affect the strength of a part. Take a. stub axle as an example of a vital part. The factor of safety is seldom so small but that a worn stub axle can be trued up and fitted with a special bush without jeopardizing its reliability. It should pay well to do so. The possibilities of the oversize part should receive most careful consideration.
FreightExchange Organization.