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10th January 1958
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Which of the following most accurately describes the problem?

Misconception Increases Speed Offences

A REPORT from the Automobile Association refers to

a considerable increase during recent months in the number of prosecutions in which owners of " dualpurpose " vehicles are concerned. These have been especially in connection with speeding offences.

During the past four months alone the Association's legal department has noted a 40 per cent. rise in these cases, applying mainly to vehicles which, although adapted to carry both passengers and goods, do not meet the official requirements for dual-purpose models.

Inquiries concerning the regulations governing these vehicles have also increased considerably. There appears to be much misunderstanding on this point, which has led many drivers to break the law unwittingly.

Summarizing the main requirements for the regulations with a view to dispelling some of this ignorance, the A.A. points out that a dual-purpose vehicle is not subject to a 30-m.p.h. speed limit outside the built-up area, provided that: (a) the unladen weight does not exceed 2 tons and the vehicle is not adapted to carry more than seven passengers, excluding the driver and (b) its construction complies with the special formula laid down. The principal points in this are that there must be a rigid roof, the vehicle must be permanently fitted with at least one transverse row of seats properly cushioned, and there must be windows of reasonable size at the sides and rear.

Any vehicle not exceeding 2 tons unladen and equipped with four-wheel drive, is classed as dual-purpose.

Full details of the regulations can be obtained from the A.A. legal department.

Car Mart's Jubilee

THIS year the well known Car Mart group of companies A are celebrating their jubilee and they are justifiably proud of their record. The founder was the late Major R. S. Grigg, who was then conducting a hire-car service. He, however, realized even in those early days, the revolution that the motor vehicle was likely to make as a means for transport.

His original enterprise was the Park Motor Co., and with a new name, The Car Mart Ltd.,.they transferred to Euston Road, London, where they became pioneers of the part-exchange business which forms so much of the selling side of the industry today. Works premises were quickly acquired in Eden Street, where munitions were made for the 1914-18 War, while the motor side of the business was marking time.

The present chairman, Mr. A. J. Rayment, joined the company in 1919. The great demand for vehicles which followed resulted in the acquisition of fine showrooms in Piccadilly, now known as Gloucester House_ As early as 1923 the company inaugurated an overseas hire service,

primarily intended for civil service and other personnel on leave from abroad. This was much appreciated.

About 1927 a hire-purchase concern, the Park Lane Trust was set up and was probably one of the first affording these useful financial facilities. Soon the Car Mart Garage was instituted in Balderton Street opposite Selfridges, this quickly developed into Dagenham Motors Ltd., who with their chain of depots form one of the largest Ford distributors, employing 500 personnel out of the 1,200 in the group. The growth was continuous and The Car Mart headquarters were transferred to Stanhope House in 1933.

Dagenham Motors also grew rapidly under the control of Mr. E. H. Grindley, and only a month or two ago extensive new premises were opened in Bayswater. Both they and The Car Mart have many other depots in London as well as in Woolwich and Colchester, whilst an ancillary company is operating in Rhodesia.

Milk Retailed from 1,000-ga/. Tanker 1HE retail delivery of milk from a 1,000-gal. bulk tanker appears to be a most unusual development. It is, however, being carried out in the African Reserves and large tea estates in the Sotik area of Kenya, by Kenya Co-operative Creameries, Ltd.

This company recently purchased a Ford Trader 5-ton chassis with cab from Hughes Ltd., Nairobi, who are said to be the principal Ford agents in Africa.

On this chassis Kenya Co-operative have mounted, in their own workshops, a stainless-steel, insulated milk tank. This tanker is equipped with a milk flowmeter which can measure, for retail purposes, any quantity from 1 gal. or even portions of this unit.

An important point is that the outfit has met the stringent rules laid down by the Board of Trade and the Kenya Department of Weights and Measures, which require absolute accuracy of the measuring equipment.

Meeting the Needs of Heavy Construction

THE building of construction machinery, particularly in connection with roads, should be greatly encouraged in Britain by our expanding schemes for the continuous development of our highway system. This is, of course, provided that financial considerations do not later cramp the activities and that successive Governments follow the lead towards meeting these vitally important requirements which has at last been given.

New atomic-power developments and the expansion of building to meet the home and export demands from industry, are also factors which may well call for more British products in this field. Hitherto, much of our heavy equipment has had to be purchased abroad, involving the expenditure of considerable sums in hard currencies, of

which there appears to be a severe shortage, which may continue for an indeterminable time.

The experience of an American company in this connection is interesting and shows that the latecomer may have as good a chance of success as those earlier in the field.

There are some 250 companies in the States, manufacturing such equipment as that for earth moving, of which about six are operating in a big way. Yet one, the Clark Equipment Co., who for some years had been largely concentrating on fork-lift trucks, formed their construction machinery division less than four years ago and started production a year later. Despite this, their sales have rapidly risen to about the seventh position and they are now challenging the big fellows.

Admittedly, Clarks had the advantage of being for years an important supplier of gearboxes and axles for goods vehicles, buses and agricultural implements, and consequently possessed a highly flexible engineering department. They started the new business by appointing a man already well versed in it. He, with seven skilled engineers, set out to discover exactly what the contractors wanted and to endeavour to meet these requirements better than their company's competitors.

Starting with comparatively small machines, their largest and latest is a 600-h.p. bulldozer, which costs $90,000 (about f32,000). It is notable that all their equipttent is pneumatictyred and one of their problems has been to convince users of steel-treaded crawler models that these tyres will not only give long service, but will afford better mobility by permitting driving on the road between jobs.

Life Copying Kneebone

LIFE' as Oscar Wilde observed, copies Art, and if the

work of Mr. Peter Kneebone, a brilliant young draughtsman with an imagination as comic as it is fertile, should set the style for late 20th Century living, some extensive changes will assuredly take place in human behaviour. In a motor factory, for example, a pantomime fairy queen may glide along an overhead conveyor, and one might see rising towards the roof an operative clinging grimly to a tyre which has assumed ascensive properties as a result of high-pressure inflation.

Or so it might seem from one of Mr. Kneebone's sketches in "Oiling the Wheels," published by Shell-Mex and B.P., Ltd., which contains reproductions of a series of advertisement drawings depicting—if that is the word—different British industries (all users of the sponsors' products).

Civil engineering has inspired the artist to delineate in operation a curious contraption with a basic resemblance to a bulldozer, but featuring also a broom (for sweeping) and a rake (for raking). At the top of a telegraph pole (which has only a peculiarly sub-conscious relevance to the subject) sits a man using a telephone, the lead from the handset of which ends in the beak of the small, fat bird which finds its way into each of Mr. Kneebone's creations.

The original advertisements, say the company, have brought in hundreds of acclamatory letters from all over the world, "including East Germany." Perhaps the influence upon Life of Mr. Kneebone's Art, being disseminated even beyond the Iron Curtain, may have world-shaking effects.


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