Passing Comments
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Who Can Represent the Road Transport Engineer . . . •
AT the recent 25th anniversary luncheon of the Institute of Transport, we had a chat with Major W. Worby Beaumont, and he expressed himself as particularly interested in the progress of the proposed Institute of Road Transpot.t Engineers. He has, of course, been for many years a member of the council of the Institution of Automobile Engineers. We had gained the impression, because of previous • inquiries made by him, that he was investigating the qualifications of the new body, but, whether this be the case or not, he stated quite definitely that he viewed it with favour and that he considered that such a body could fulfil a valuable function in getting the operating engineers together. He claimed, however, that the I.A.E. has some 200 members who are engaged in this field. In this connection, we would point out that whereas it has taken 38 years for the I.A.E. to obtain this number of members in this particular class, the I.R.T.E. has received nearly 1,000 applications for membership over a period of a few months. American Views on QOTVIE interesting prophecies the Post-war Fuel 0--iconcerning the grades and Position costs of liquid fuel in America were given a few months ago in a paper read before the American Society of Automotive Engineers. The author said that as an aid to economy high-octane petrol holds out great promise, for a given quantity will provide anything up to twice the power which could be obtained from an equivalent' measure of fuel of pre-war standard, and the gain in efficiency would more than offset the slightly higher cost. As regards the price, 87 octane may be taken as a basis; above that number additional expense is probable; The use of lead is the cheapest way of increasing the octane ,value. In addition to aviation spirit, the American oil companies expect to market two grades of petrol for use in motors, and a third to operate tractors. The octane values will be, 'aviation 100 or More, premium grade 85-87, regular 75-77 and tractor grade 70.The premium fuel will cost about 2 cents more than the regular. Using Margarine as a WHILE walking around the Fuel for an Oil TV Seddon works the other
Engine day, on the occasion of the Distributors' Conference, to which reference was made in our issue of October 27, Mr. Seddon pointed to a vehicle standing outside thc works and offered, for anyone who cared to take advantage of it, to run the vehicle around the town on anyone's margarine ration. In explanation a this somewhat surprising remark, he told us that this was the vehicle on which had been carried out those extensive experiments on the use of various vegetable oils as fuel—experiments which were fully described in " The Commercial Motor" at the time, and although the vehicle at present is not using vegetable oils of any kind, but is running on Diesel oil, it still carries the essential equipment and could, as Mr. Seddon affirmed, quite easily be made to operate on a pound or so of margarine
Natural Conditions, INTERESTING views on Not Loads, Demand I highway construction have Strong Roads . . been put forward by the
Fruehauf Trailer Co., of Detroit. It states that road engineers know that surfaces thick enough to withstand soil and weather conditions do not require additional depth to carry even the heaviest of modern vehicles with their lowpressure tyres, scientific distribution of weight, impact-cushioning springs and effective shock absorbers. In fact, surveys by the Federal Government have shown that main roads would be built just as thick and strong to-day, even if only private cars were operating on them. The major factor is the load on each wheel or axle, not the total load. This is an important matter which deserves more public ventilation, and indicates one reason why there should not be discriminating taxation against commercial road transport.