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A Popular Guide to A USEFUL, although un the City of Birmingauthorized, road guide ham service is now operating on the routes approaching Birmingham. Drivers approaching the ring road are "waved down" to a stop by peaked-cap exdrivers' mates, who, professing to know every road in the city, now offer their services as guides. Enlisting the assistance of one of these guides on a recent visit to Bromwich, the city crossing was made in less than half the normal time, for which service the guide received 2s. 6d. Apparently these guides enjoy_ the benefit of unemployment pay, and, by making an average of eight journeys across the city each day, can, during a seven-day week, obtain a further £7 free from tax., That this service is well organized was revealed by a remark that the guides had a working agreement not to make more than
A20 eight journeys a day, thereby keeping them all fully employed. It will be interesting to note how the Government labour plans will affect this service, which• is made necessary by insufficient signposting.
A Case Where a A CCORDING to "T h e Double-decker was r-IGlasgow Herald," a Needed passenger-transport concern is
said to have been asked by a Government official to send a bus to carry some men to work. The clerk inquired how many there would be, and the answer was three, but no querying of the order was permitted. However, a few minutes later came another telephone call to say that the vehicle should be a double-decker. The clerk ventured to ask if the number of passengers had been increased. The reply was" No; there are still three, but it has just been learned that one of them does not smoke." A Etrief Explanation of How "Tim" TRANSPORT is a business that depends very much upon keeping strictly to time. In this connection many operators must make use of the famous telephone speaking clock, "Tim." Some people think of this as merely an ordinary gramophone record, but there is far more to it. Designed and built at the Post Office Engineering Research Station at Dollis Hill, the method of recording used resembles that of the talking film. In it, however, four glass discs are employed instead of celluloid. The sound tracks on the discs are recordings of phrases and numbers from which the complete announcement is built up by shining beams of light on the appropriate tracks in turn. The light passes through the tracks on to photoelectric cells. These permit the passage of electric currents, which are then amplified so greatly that up to 200 subscribers can listen to the announcements simultaneously. A synchronous electric motor drives Works the discs and other mechanism, and the whole is kept in time by another combinatiOn of light-beam and photo-electric cell controlled by a seconds pendulum. Accuracy to one-tenth second is the standard.
Air Transport Helps pOAD transport must begin Shell Oil Production a •to look to its laurels if the in Ecuador . . . . work carried out recently by Bristol Freighter aircraft operating with the Shell Company in Ecuador is indicative of the future. In 40 flying days one Freighter in this South American Republic carried nearly 900,000 lb., despite many return flights made light and time lost in loading and unloading by unskilled native labour. The cargoes included Caterpillar tractors, Torneau scrapers, cattle, cement, food, lorries, Jeeps, etc., some of the individual items weighing up to 8,000 lb. Much of this had to be carried at a height of over 20,000 ft., across mountains.