News and Comment.
Page 47
Page 50
If you've noticed an error in this article please click here to report it so we can fix it.
This Journal has the largest and most valuable circulation amongst users and prospective users: the circulation now exceeds 8,000 copies weekly, exclusive of any extra numbers for special issues.
Southampton Town Council is about to purchase a motor fire-engine at an estimated cost of £750.
The annual meeting of the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders will be held on Thursday, the znd proximo, at 2.30 p.m., at Maxwell House, Arundel Street, Strand,. W.C.
The results of our Japanese supplement, which was printed in the Japanese language, and which accompanied several thousand copies of our issue of the 30th November, 1905, are now becoming apparent,and a perusal of the pages of various motor journals bear testimony, without acknowledgment, to that fact.
The important conference between road makers and road users, which is to be held at Olympia to-morrow (Friday), beginning at three o'clock, will be open to members of the Commercial Motor Users' Association, free of charge, on presentation of their membership cards. Free admission to the building is also included, and an interesting discussion is expected.
The leading French journal which is devoted to the interests of commercial motors, " Le Poids Lourd," deals at considerable length, in its current number, with the recent Olympia Exhibition, and its report, which is largely based upon our own, includes upwards of 20 illustrations supplied by " TOE COMMERCIAL Moo." Our contemporary uses the most serious arguments in its efforts to impress upon French manufacturers what it terms " Le Peril Anglais," and urges one and all to greater efforts to help forward the position of the French industry in regard to heavy motor traffic. We hope to include the text of the conditions for the R.A.C. Commercial Motor Trials in our next issue.
Vauxhall Motors, Limited, has. taken over the motor department of the Vauxhall and West Hydraulic Engineering Company, Limited, and a portion of the large premises at Luton, Bedfordshire.
• Mr. Tom Williams, who was for some years with Friswell (1906), Limited, as secretary, has been appointed assistant manager and secretary of the new company.
. Messrs. Tasker and Sons, of Andover, advise us that they have taken a repeat order for one of their "Bz" compound tractors, with patent springgear, from Messrs. R. White and Sons, the wellknown mineral water manufacturers, as well as for one of the same type, with two wagons, for the Brelornhill Collieries, Limited, of Acklington, Northumberland.
Arising out of the development of its motor vehicle department, Sir W. G. Armstrong, Whitworth and Company, Limited, has found it necessary to retmove its London offices from Great Peter Street, Westminster, -to extensive show and reception rooms at 3, Blenheim Street, New Bond Street, W. This department of the famous Tyneside company is under the direction of Mr. Edmund Gascoine, and our readers will remember that the cornpany 's motorbus and 3i-ton lorry chassis was illustrated in our issue Of the zist February last, together with a descriptive account of the equipment nf the company's Scotswood department..
The accompanying illustration of one of the Lancashire Steam Motor Company's wagons is taken from a photograph of one of two vehicles fitted with tipping bodies which have recently been constructed in the Leyland works, at short notice, to the order of the British Admiralty. -These wagons have been specially geared to run at the unusual speed of eight miles an hour, and are, we understand, intended for use in the cartage of sailors' kits between the ships and the barracks and the .railway stations at -Portsmouth. The makers of these machines have on order a large number of steam wagons, and their present activity furnishes one direct contradiction to the interested expressions of belief that steam vehicles are passing into the limbo of forgotten things. One of the orders now approaching completion at Leyland is a standard 5-ton municipal wagon, fitted with interchangeable tipping body and street-watering tank, for the Corpora. tion of Belfast, and it is expected that this vehicle will be on view at the Bel. fast Agricultural Show in May. We understand that the prospectus of the Renard Road and Rail Transport Corporation, Limite.d, with an
authorised capital of ,25o non, will shortly be issued, and that there %yin be an equal division, into 7 per cent, preference, and ordinary shares. The directorate will be exceptionally strong, and the Right Hon. Lord Ribblesdale, P.C., will be chairman, whilst MajorGeneral Sir John C. Ardagh, K.C.M.G., will be vice-chairman. .
The date of the opening of the next Paris Salon has been fixed for the 12th of November, and it will close on the 1st of December. The exhibition will include commercial motors, this classification being put down as comprising vehicles weighing more than 2.12.. tons unladen, and all passenger vehicles capable of carrying more than eight persons. The advance in the date of the show will be noted with interest by British manufacturers, as the motive is °by ions.
The report of the judges in the Vapour Emission Competition, of which we gave a preliminary report in our issue of the zist ultimo, brackets the Pilgrim and Lanchester cars as equal for the first award, and gives the second award to the 24h.p. Albion car. Although all the entries in this competition were for private purposes, the engine results are interesting to users of alt motor vehicles.. The average discharge of carbon monoxide was less than 2 per cent. by volume of the whole exhaust gases in the case of 33 per cent. of the engines. We are glad to note that the judges have given each competitor the results of the analyses appertaining to his own vehicle, in order that improvements may be introduced.
Wolseley-Siddeley Cabs for Cardiff.
Mr. Gibbon Brooks, of the Motor House, 51, Queen Street, Cardiff, is taking active steps, in concert with a number of local gentlemen, to place an efficient service of taximeter motorcabs on the streets of Cardiff, and the farerecording instruments will be hirrd from the Metropolitan Fare Register Company, Limited, on a five years' contract. The chassis will be of the Wolseley-Siddeley make, with to-I2h.p. twocylinder engines, and will be fitted with bodies of the landaulette type, adapted to be used either open cr closed, and all the tires will have inner tubes filled with " Elastes." We are glad to note that, at the last meeting of the Cardiff Watch Committee, the necessary licenses for six of these cabs to ply for hire were granted, and the official view in Cardiff is that the new vehicles can ply for hire at any rates their owners
like to adopt below the maximum, as fixed by the city by-laws, of is. per mile. This forebodes serious competition with local owners of horse vehicles.
An interesting catalogue of motor accessories and spare parts is issued by G. T. Riches and Company, of tg, Store Street, Tottenham Court Road, W.C. Guardians Place an Order.
The trials organised by the Belgian Automobile Club for commercial motor vehicles commenced on the 7th instant, a start being made by the vehicles entered from Brussels. The first stage of the run from Brussels to Anvers, a distance of 68 kilometres, comprised a stretch of some 12 kilometres of good macadam road, followed by paved roads from. Tervaeren to Malines, Waelhern, Wa.arloos and Anvers. The second stage, covered on the following day, extended from Anvers to Gand. At both of these towns the vehicles were exhibited on their arrival. The last stage was the return journey iron Gand to Brussels. The route is shown on the map which we publish on :his page, the total distance covered being some zoo kilometres. Should an official report be published, it will appear in our columns in due course.
Guardians Place an Order.
The applications to which commercial motors can be put are 'numerous and varied, and one of the latest examples of this fact is provided by the placing of an order for the Glasgow Parish Council with the Albion Motor Car Company, Limited, of Scotstoun, Glasgow. This vehicle is to have a 12-seated body, and it will be put in service to .convey applicants for poor relief from the Council's office to different workhouses and hospitals. The specification. provides that the machine shall be capable of ascending gradients in excess of T. in to, which is very necessary, having regard to the steepness of some of Glasgow's streets, and we have little doubt that a great economy will result. The Albion vehicle has been selected from amongst a number of other tenders, and it proves that shrewd business men in Glasgow do not think it necessary to go outside their own Country. N.crr Motor Ambulances for the Metropolis.
At the meeting of the Metropolitan Asylums Board on Saturday, the Ambulance Committee reported having rec.eived the following tenders for the supply of two motor omnibuses. One bus to carry 16 persons :—Bristol Wagon and Carriage Works Company (informal) : (a) with tires, ;6.98o; (b) without tires, £86o; to be delivered in 12 weeks. J. T. Thornycroft and Com pany (informal) : (a) ; (b) ,;i800; to be delivered in in weeks. Dennis Bros., Limited : (a) £870; (b) £785; delivered in eight weeks. Halley's industrial Motors, Limited : (a) ;,,/_,;79o; (b) £720; delivered in four weeks. The Berna Motors, Limited : (a) £775; (b) £690 ; delivered in four weeks. The Lancashire Steam Motor Company, Limited (recommended for b) : (a) £765; (b) ,,-.715; to be delivered in 15 weeks. The Hercules Motor Wagon Company : ,,„:735; (b) ,645; delivered in nine weeks. Commercial Cars, Limited : (a) ,4:;733; (b) ,4„:,-663; delivered in five weeks. One bus to carry to persons.—Bristol Wagon and Carriage Works Company (informal) : (a) with tires, ,L,..9,55; (b) without tires, £830. S. Thornycroft and Company (informal) : (a) £770; (b) £726. Dennis Brothers, Limited (recommended for h): (a) „4-785; (b) £700. Halley's 'Industrial Motors, Limited : (a) £770; (b) £700. The Berna Motor, Limited : (a) -L775; (b.) £690. The Plercuks Motor Wagon Company, Limited : (a) -<6so Jos. ; (b) L56o tos. Glover Brothers (a) .4.585; (b) L55o. A. R.
Garnett (informal) : with solid tires
with pneumatic tires to back wheels. The specifications and drawings sent in with the tenders were submitted to Col. R. E. Crompton for examination, and it was upon his advice that the committee recommended that the tender of the Lancashire Steam Motor Company, Limited, be accepted for the motorbus to seat 16 persons, and the tender of Dennis Brothers, Limited, for the bus to scat io persons,—The recommendations were adopted, and formal orders will be isstied at once. '