The Motor Drivers News.
Page 19
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The Conductor as a Float.
" W.W.J." (Bridgwater) writes :—" Whilst on the road. driving my bus, on a recent occasion, I found it impossible to run my engine, owing to the fact that the float of the carburetter had been punctured. I took the float out of the carburetter, and found that it had a very bad leak, and that it was full of petrol inside. In this condition it was useless, and I, therefore, removed it from the float chamber altogether. The engine was fed by gravity. so I got the conductor to govern the petrol feed from the tap on the tank that shuts off the spirit. With this arrangement I was able to get home safely with the vehicle."
Why Not Speedometers?
" S.0." (London) writes as follows With reference to the letter from R.T.,' in your issue of October 24th, I quite agree with him that it would be a splendid idea to have speedometers fitted to the lighter types of commercial vehicles, but I do not see what useful purpose they would serve on vehicles whose average speed is, say, five miles per hour. There are drivers. I suppose, who think more of getting home than of their wagon, but this class of man is on the decrease, and, throughout my time as a driver—I have been in charge of all sorts of vehicles—I Can only call to mind two men who really did not care in the least for their wagons. These men, I remember, always used to growl when pay day came round, because they received less than the others, quite forgetting that they had themselves to blame, owing to the fact that they hardly ever received the bonus which was given for non-breakdown trips. They used to rattle along at a tremendous pace, after spending a lot of time at some convenient public house. I admit that the steam-wagon driver has a certain amount of excuse for stopping, because I must say that, especially in summer, there is hardly anything more trying than driving such."
" T.J.B." (Tooting) writes the following letter :—" I was interested in a letter which appeared under the initials `R.T.,' in your issue of October 24th, with reference to the employment of speedometers on commercial motor vehicles. I myself think that they are useful to guard against police convictions, but it should not be necessary to fit one of these instruments to a car, to make the driver go consistently and steadily, because he should know, to a mile or two per hour, at what speed the vehicle is running. One must, of course, remember that there are drivers and would-be drivers two very different things. It is to be acknowledged also, that all are not angels, but, on the other hand, very few of us will risk a line of 405. and 25. costs for exceeding the speed limit, in order to get a ' drink,' Most of us know that a vehicle that is driven by fits and starts will very soon require a thorough overhauling, to say nothing of possible roadside troubles which necessitate the driver getting under the frame to put things right again. When we work for a weekly wage and get a shilling bonus per load for successful runs, it is to our own interest to look after the vehicle and run it properly, not risking our living for a drink.' I presume that R.T.' refers to coffee as well as beer, under the generic name of drink.' I have been driving a wagon for seven years, and, during that time, I have always found time to get my meals without taking it out of the wagon.
" With reference to a drivers' society, I am glad to be able to inform R.T.' that such an institution exists, and that we are not by any means dead, nor sleeping. IF he had come up to the scratch, instead of waiting to see if we survived, he would have found that we were doing some good work in a quiet way, and, at the same tune, he might have been able to help us. The Amalgamated Society of Motor Drivers had its inception in September, 1906, and it holds its meetings at the Essex Head Hotel, Essex Street, Strand, W.C., on the first and third Saturdays of each month. Letters sent to that address will receive proper attention."
The Perfect Driver.
" ES.'' (Rhymney) writes to us as follows :—" I have been for months past an interested reader of the different experiences of steam-wagon drivers. As a man who has had twelve years of practical driving of traction engines and steam wagons, I think I am in a position to give some advice. I maintain that there are four attributes which a driver must have, to he perfect in his work, and these are as follows :—
" Firstly, he must possess plenty of will power, iron-will power, if you prefer it. " Secondly, he should have an ice-cream head. " Thirdly, he should have wrought-iron nerves. " Fourthly, he should have steel eyes.
" Now, having told you what I consider are the points of a good driver, I will tell you my method for gaining them. " I.—Never touch intoxicants in any form.
"n—Do not smoke too much and chew only your food.
" 3.—Keep away from evil companions. " 4.-Take only such food and nourishment as will feed your muscles and brain.
" I can do fifty miles a day on my wagon, and, when I arrive at the shed at night .and don my old jacket, I am not too tired to put heart and soul into -cleaning down."
An Ingenious Idea.
" A.B." (Acton) sends an account of an incident which occurred to him recently : --" Most of the experiences which have befallen drivers and have been related on the Drivers News ' page appear to be ordinary everyday affairs, but I think the following is really unusual, and I have never heard of such an incident occurring before. I was doing my last journey on my motorbus the other night, when, about three miles from the garage, the engine suddenly stopped. On looking for the cause of the hitch, I found that the back plate of the magneto had slacked off and that the gear wheel, the armature, and the plate, had all disappeared. I hunted round for the pieces, and eventually found them lying in the road a short distance back, but, unfortunately, they were useless because they had fallen in the track of one of the back wheels and had been run over; this had smashed the spindle and the gear wheel, and had made the Parts quite useless. Just after I had found the pieces, another Vehicle came along in the same direction as that in which I had been travelling, so I asked the driver to stop as it was the last N'chicle on the route for the night, and I did not like the idea of being by the roadside until morning. His conductor suggested wiring my engine up to his magneto as an experiment. This sounded rather impossible, until we started to think about it. We tried to get the front cylinders of the two engines to 'lire ' at the same moment, but with no result, We then disconnected the lead from the bus bar on my engine, and we started up the other one, and when it was running properly, I attached the lead again to my engine. This method stopped his motor, and we tried it again with the same result, but, on the third attempt, both rimogines ran quite normally. The two vehicles ran to the gaPage side by side, much to the amusement of 04.11few passengers. When we arrived at our destination, I disconnected the wire, and my vehicle was pushed through the gate into the yard. I have never heard of any driver getting out of a similar difficulty in the same manner."
[It is remarkable that the speed of the two engines should have so nearly synchronised even with H.T. ignition, as to render this feat