LEAVES FROM THE INSPECTOR'S NOTEBOOK.
Page 13
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Motor Coach Improvements Wanted. Scotland Yard and the Giant. The W.D.
and the M.T.
By " Inspector."
F I MIGHT hazard a guess, I should pr&lict that there will be far larger total of chars-h-bancs (completeor bodywork alone) than of any other single type of machine at the forthcoming Show. And there will be good and laad machines of this class staged—quite a few poor ones and yet not one of the beat. By that I mean that I shall be surprised if we see anything at Olympia which we shall be justified in assuming to be the last word in coachwork design for public-service trip work.
There is much to be said in criticism of the present accepted type of charel-bance, and in particular of, the inadequate protection it affords against bad weather. And this, however much "de luxe " the owner has insisted upon. It is of little help to be sitting on " real leather hide, pleated or buttoned,'-' if a young cascade of real water is renning down your neck, or if a north-easter is penetrating the seams of your expensive coney-nutria-sable. Except in the matter of seating, and sometimes of knee-room, I think the present char-a-bancs is a most inconvenient type. I am certain we shall see great improvements during the next season or two. Some of them will, to my • knowledge, be foreshadowed at the Show. * It is a'certainty that the so-oalled one-man hood for these big machines will have to. go. It is expensive, heavy, extremely clumsy in its best forms, and an eyesore: Something in the lines of Bartle's new sectional hood is, as good. a solution of the hood question as I have seen to date. But I rather fancy the chances of fixed tops • in fact, a reversion to the ancient canopy—but without its tassels=a fixed top with removable windows, a type that the G.W.R., for instance, found so useful for its country services.
I feel that the deciding factor in the choice of a body type will be the desire of the coach owner not to miss a journey because of the weather. With a fixed top and with windows that can be let down, he can say to his "Book your seats ; the trip will be carried out, wet or fine; if it is wet we give you ample protection, and the chance is that, a few miles out, we , shall run into fine weather." When the competition becomes fiercer. (although I think we have not yet touched the fringe of the motor coach use -and development), the coach owners will be less anxious to 'return the money and keep the coach in the garage all day because it is wet at the point of departure.
It is surely not a rash prophecy to suggest that there will he little to choose between the singledecker and the motor coach as these designs develop. And there is going to be a big boom in single-deekers —a boom that will be with us before we know it— and that in spite of the slump!
Scotland Yard and the 'Giant.
know our esteemed Editor never expects me to be conventional and, whilst not conaidering himself bound by my unorthodox views, he generally lets me "have my. head" to a gratifying extent. For instanee, I have all along been one of the ,few who has refused to "fall off the deep end" with regard to pneumatics for heavy models—and I seem to have ads impression that he, toe, has kept up 'alongside of me on the drY ground! I have not waved a little flag because, for purely domestic reasons, certain American tyre importers found it necessary to embark upon intensive propaganda to Push the sale of large size pneumatics. Tales of America's reliance on such tyres and of its dislike for twin solids leave me cold. I felt just as cold when America told us of the hundreds of thousands of electric in U.S.A., and of the doom of the Y gasolene truck," and that they had no use for the steamer.
For once in a way, we know more in this country about all kinds of industrial vehicle haulage than does any other nation in the world—including America.. And we produce better wagons.'.: The British Army owned and managed the finest M.T. equipment in the field, and would have been even better found if it could have managed without importing from America and elsewhere.
I believe, still, that we shall find the pneumatic tyre, for all but the lighter models, is going to be very little used here and in most of our Colonies. What we shall see will be a reversion to what used to be called cushion tyres in some new form or other. Cost and clumsiness are going to beat the ten-inch pneumatic—here at any rate. Scotland Yard has just decided not to licence any heavy hackney carriages BO fitted in the Metropolitan Police area—and that carries some weight. Thin pneumatics will be permitted. I do not know if Scotland Yard consulted New York I
W.D. and M.T.
Considering the enormous services which our industry was able, and glad to be able, to render to the Empire in its war need, it has been treated with but consideration in many ways since. Why, for instance, should this country be the dumping ground of so much foreign war-used KT, I Not only have we had tens of thousands of machines of our own to digest, but we have had to absorb hundreds.. of ,vehicies originally purchased for Russia, similar quantities intended for ,U S.A., and now, owing to Exchange conditions, we. are being offered Italian stuff. • All this is incalculably harmful to our own production. It would Seem reasonable to suppose that, in the light of Our past achievements, the Government should adopt any and .every expedient to build up still further the nation's facilities for producing transport at home, in vast quantities when again the trumpet sounds—as it will some day.
Will it be credited that, with the desire to discover another suitable armoured ear.chassis, the " authorities " have rebently .purchased for experiment an American, Cadillac and an Italian Fiat, and have formulated the opinion that nothing more suitable is to be had in this country' Leekily;;We•have• a Wax Minister Who does not agree that we should depend on U.S.A..-or Thais= for future War supplies?'