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m HE remarkable discoveries of Roman and pre Roman remains at Verulamium—England's Pompeii, near St. Albans—include a well-preserved prehistoric cart track, the ruts being 8 ins, deep and 4 ft. 8i, ins. wide (to wheel centres). These ruts can claim to be the oldest wheel tracks yet found in Britain, and they evidence the antiquity of the 4-ft. 8i-in, track for vehicles.
ONE often wonders what happens to old vehicles when they are past their ordinary span of commercial life. One Warrick carrier, at least, has found a new role, after years of delivery work. An itinerant knife-grinder has bought it, fitted up shelves in the box body, installed an emery wheel at the front with a treadle drive and provided a canopy so that work can be kept dry. Perhaps he is now scheming a power take-off for the grinding outfit. WE were inquiring recently whether enclosed flexible cables for the final stage of brake-power transmission are proving satisfactory in service, and we learned that trouble with these is practically unheard of, except where owners seek to obtain an improved tidiness about their vehicles by tightly tying the cables to the frame A VAN driver employed by a reader had an ex perience recently which must surely be unique. He was about to draw up at the side of the road and, as he did so, a pedestrian, who must have been "in the clouds" made to step off the pavement, from which purpose he was deterred by the presence of the van, whereupon he turned to the driver and soundly rated him for, as he put it, "pulling up his van so quickly "1. AN accident which occurred in London the other day opens up an aspect of the traffic problem which is worthy of more than a little consideration. A man was knocked down and seriously injured by a car travelling in the wrong direction along a oneway street. On the arrival of a constable to take particulars in the usual manner it was discovered that the driver of the ear was a foreigner who did not understand a word of English.
NOTICES of one-way streets, of streets to which access is forbidden, or dangerous crossings, and of all the various traffic directions by which our road journeyings are governed mean nothing to anyone who cannot read them. Consequently, the question arises, as to whether the time is not rapidly approaching when it will be advisable to devise an international code of traffic signals, so that all will be able to interpret them, wherever they may be. ACCORDING to a report from France, that country imports some 188 metric tons of ball bearings per annum. Taken on a percentage basis, Italy supplies 35, Sweden 32, Great Britain 11, Germany 10, U.S.A. 4, and sundry others 8. Of roller bearings the imports are 152 metric tons, the percentage supplied being Germany 31, U.S.A. 25, Sweden 18, Great Britain 10, others 16.
ALTHOUGH at the present time windscreens with curved tops are not used on commercial vehicles, there is a vogue for this design in the car world, and a clever solution to the difficulty of arranging for the top glass to hinge has been overcome ingeniously by Cox and Co. by means of a rubber strip along the top edge, which performs the dual purpose of preserving a watertight joint and acting as a hinge sufficiently flexible to compensate for the curvature of the frame.