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Not measuring up
Page 49
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Vauxhall's new chairman, Bob Price, has a nice line in American throwaway humour. Meeting the press recently he explained that in the course of his General Motors executive career he'd had nine major moves, involving household uprootings — he comes to Britain from running GM South Africa and 'hasbeen m.d. of GM Suisse and GM Continental. Then, after a beautifully timed pause, he added: "My father-in-law says I just can't seem to hold a job down."
Busman's holiday
Another link with the early days of coaching was severed on April 30: Briah Andrews, publicity officer at Victoria Coach Station, retired after 43 years in long-distance coaching. I went along to his farewell occasion, attended mainly by his working colleagues, and when he was asked what his first retirement activity would be, he replied: "Take a Southdown coach tour of the Wye Valley and Devon — I've been looking forward to it for years."
That's what 1 call dedication to the cause of coaching — but it's only a start. He's then off to the Sudan, Egypt and Jerusalem. Not by South down well, not yet.
Old times
When a copy of Ford Times with a First World War cover dropped on my desk this week I thought at first that someone had been having a clear-out of old magazines, but it turned out to be a 70th anniversary issue, commemorating seven decades of Ford in Britain.
Although Ford Motor Company Limited — as it was registered — was formed in 1903 it was not until the spring of the next year that the first Ford vehicle reached these shores allegedly a Model A (not to be confused with the much later Model A) ordered by a doctor "specializing in the treatment of wealthy lunatics".
A lunatic fringe of another type is dealt with in this issue by truck-driver Cyprian Thompson, who explains the risk run by motorists who dice with heavies — and the unthinking selfishness which puts hgv drivers in awkward situations.
Apparently Cyprian is worried that his truck-driving career could be put at risk because people will automatically assume that the big-vehicle driver is responsible when a car/ truck collision occurs. I think he's overstating the case, but I can understand his concern.
Power problem
A nice poser has arisen over the installation of tachographs in fuel tankers. As things stand they are due, as dangerous-load vehicles, to be fitted with tachographs by January 1, 1976 to meet EEC regulations. The modern tacho is electrically powered — but spirit tankers have a master switch by which the driver turns off all the electrics before approaching the loading point, to avoid the risk of spark-ignited fires.
The tankers also normally have all their electrics isolated by master switch at night, not only as a safety measure but also because the "master switch on" warning includes red lights on top of the tank, where a driver on the catwalk can see them, and operators don't wish to leave these on all night.
An obvious answer would be to revert to clockwork mechanism for the tachographs, but this would make the tankers odd men out, and operators fear they could get the short end of the spares and service business in years to come. I gather another solution, which sounds like being acceptable all round, is to have a small rechargeable battery to drive the tacho, on a closed circuit.