Bird's Eye View
Page 48
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"Sits. Vac." 4 x 4
By The Hawk
ABOUT 12 months ago John Moon was glancing idly (so he says) down the -"Situations Vacant column and noticed an .advertisement by AB Wheel Drive. Ltd., asking for draughtsmen and designers. He applied. not for a job, but for information on the company's activities. As a result, this issue contains an, exclusive test report of the new Leyland A.W.D, 4 x 4. There. are, I am told, other equally satisfactory designs to hallow.
Corps of Distinction
NAR. W. P. JAMES, chairman of the West Midland Traffic IVI Commissioners, would apparently like the Road Operators' Safety Council to extend their safe-driving competition to private motorists. Presenting safe-driving awards to drivers of the Birmingham and Midland Motor Omnibus Co., Ltd., he said: "1 often wonder why a scheme of this kind is restricted to drivers of public service vehicles. I should think the responsible authorities might well try to build up among private motorists the kind of exclusive society to which you belong. The idea of creating a corps of distinction among • people who use the roads appeals to me very much.They would presumably advertise their achievement with C.D. plates.
Chaser
AHULL lorry driver last week had a remarkable escape from being run over by his own vehicle. After a front tyre had burst, the lorry skidded into a lamp standard. and the driver was thrown through the windscreen and landed in the path-of the moving vehicle. Fortunately it hit a wall and stopped a few feet from him as he lay unconscious. \What is perhaps even more extraordinary was that he was able to return home after treatment for head injuries.
Staggering
A STAGGERING success is reported from Sunderland, where the main engineering and shipbuilding companies have agreed to spread over working hours to help Sunderland Corporation's bus undertaking. What Sunderland does today the rest of the country seems unlikely to do tomorrow.
No Gentleman!
AR. S. W. NELSON, Western Licensing Authority, was in his usual good form last week when he heard an application by a farmer for a B licence. It was clear, said Mr, Nelson, that the applicant was a farmer in a substantial way of business and should not be regarded as a gentleman farmer. A gentleman farmer was one who raised only his hat.
When a brickmak.er whose works were siding-connected gave evidence that the railway was used only when he required bricks for his own purposes, Mr. Nelson asked: "How high are the weeds now?"
Counsel for the railways: "Weedkiller is used from time to time, sir."
Niggler and Fidgeter
NAR. R. B. BRITTA1N, of Essex Carriers, Ltd., has the IVI problem of moving a Hogmuddle Rotary Niggler and Fidgeter from Southend to Morecambe. it is 50 ft. long, 9 ft. wide and 12 ft high, but should travel safety on one • of Essex Carriers' pole-wagons. As even the most erudite of my engineering readers will probably never have encountered a niggler and fidgeter (apart, of course, from their managing directors) 1 hasten to explain that it is a set-piece, based on an Emmett cartoon, used in the Southend illuminations and now sold to the northern resort.
Mr. Brittain tells me that each spring there is a series of transfers between the five resorts. which make a special feature of illuminations and his men are by now well experienced in handling the material.
Portuguese Oddity
I HAVE news from Portugal that an odd feature of vehicle I registration, which causes embarrassment to dealers in imported vehicles, may soon be amended. Current regulations demand that a vehicle be regstered and fitted with plates as soon as it is taken out of Customs, Registrations' run in strict letter and numerical order, so that if a vehicle remains in a showroom for a few weeks potential buyers often claim that it is an obsolete model.
It is hoped that the authorities will remedy this situation by allowing the general practice of not fitting registration plates until a sale is made.
Mr. Cox and Mrs. Box
I N preparing duty rosters it is often difficult enough to avoid industrial strife, but when domestic upheavals have to be prevented as well, anyone is welcome to the job. It can, however, be done successfully. as a London bth, conductress told me last week. Her husband is a driver and for the past • 11 . years they have been working on a Cox and Box plan, so that their three small children are never left alone. 14er husband certainty cannot accuse her of back-seat driving.