Land Under the Plough : 'total Increase to Date this Year.
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The official figures were stated in the House of Commons, on Wednesday of last week, for the increase in area of land under the plough, in England and Wales, for 1917 as compared with 1916. The total addition is only 300,000 acres, for both horse and mechanical ploughing. This combined result is seen to to be very much below the hopeful estimates of March last, at which date, from not a few official and semiofficial spokesmen, one heard estimates running to at least double the realised area. Nobody wishes to put forward excuses, and probably least of all those who had certain grounds for advancing the estimates to which we refer. Weather, labour, plant and supplies have been more difficult than ever before, since the inauguration of the agrimotor push by Mr. P. D. L. Perry a little more than three months ago.. It now remains to be proved how much below or above the average the yield will be. Come out of the ground what may, in the shape of garnered wheat, it is clear that many valuable lessons have been learnt, for the guidance of everybody during the remainder of 1917, and for all future time. The cost has been heavy, and threatens to be heavier still— even to reach 22 per acre for labour, hire and maintenance of machinery, supplies and supervision. The vital gain is this. Germany has not starved us out, and she will be unable to do so but we still believe that steam will make by far the best showing in added acreage by the time all records are collated 12 or 15 months hence.
More About Chassis Suspensions.
It is interesting, in View of thevincreased amount of attention which the matter of springing is receiving at the hands of users and makers at home, which increased attention is reflected alike both in our editorial and correspondence columns, to read the fifth article of our series "Chariots of War I Rave Driven ,'1 which article appears on pages 350 to 352. The writer of this series, asureaders of his. articles will realize, has had a pretty varied experience of heavy vehicles. His actual connection with the motor trade dates back long before August, 1914. In the course of the present
• article, which, incidentally, is about the Daimler chassis, he deals at some length with this question of adequate springing. He gives high praise to the Daimler in this respect, as in others, basing his opinion rather on individual observation of lorries which have come under his notice, as well as on a particular chassis of which he had personal experience as driver. It should be noted, moreover, that his own vehicle was an unfortunate choice. being very far gone in neglect, particularly of the springing, when it came into his hands. It will be gathered, therefore, that, although his remarks on suspensions in general, and the Daimler in particular, are based upon a fairly wide experience, that he had special facilities in the case of the particular Daimler which was in his charge of obterving the effects of ill springing as exaggerated by neglect of tile system of suspension actually in vogue on this chassis.
It must, of course, be borne in mind that our contributor, throughout his article, writes of the effects bf vehicle-use in a battle-scarred area, and gat the first effect of the rough going thus experienced will be shown through or upon the springs. It is possible, by overlooking this sapient fact, to derive wrong and harinfuhconclusions, the conditions being too arduous for the ordinary commercial vehicle to withstand for long. If this first he realized, however, and the war-use considered rather in the nature of a test to destruction, from which, by examination of the results, suitable factors of safety may be' deduced, as well as ideas for improvement of the build of peace-time commercial motors, the lessons will not be in vain.
He says that, as a result of his own experience, he is of opinion that there is more scope for improvement in springing than in any other feature of the modern commercial-vehicle chassis, and he looks forward to interesting developments in this respect—in what he terms the " super lorry "—which should result from the manufacturers' observations in the course of the "super test" of war-time usage. His suggestion that provision will have to be made for light running as well as loaded is not A new one. Several devices have been proposed, and not a few are in daily use, with the object of absorbing the vibration when light, whilst at the same time catering for the requirements of the loaded vehicle by the aid of supplementary springs or some similar device. Not the least successful, of course, is that very simple device adopted by the L.G.O.C. of an inverted coil spring bearing upon the centre of the semi-elliptical spring, and only having its maximum effect when the load upon the vehicle approaches its full capacity. The same, or similar constructions have been adopted by other makers. Our own opinion, to which we last gave expression in a leading article on page 284 of our issue of the 31st ult., that improved suspension would go far towards eliminating the need for weight reduction, is borne out independently by our contributor when he points out that inadequacy of the springing of most vehicles when running light has a much more intensive fatiguing effect than a similar amount of fully-loaded travel. It is undoubtedly, as we stated, a fact that, but for the damaging effect of defective springing which is most felt when unloaded, most of the chassis components2oould be made lighter, and the result, besides a more comfortable-riding vehicle, would be a lessening of the overall, weight of the chassis. Signs are not wanting that this particular department of chassis design is at length receiving the attention it deserves at the hands of manufacturers. We have before us the drawings of an after-the-peace chassis, the design of which embodies an improved departure from current practice on the lines that were suggested in our recent editorials We hope to be able, in an early issue, to publish Rode of the details of the construction of this particular chassis.