CLEVER ROADSIDE REPAIRS.
Page 29
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How Some ,Driver and Mechanic Readers Overcame Difficulties Met on the Road.
ALONDON correspondent, "
of Deptford, is awarded the 15s. prize this week for his letter describing how he most ingeniously got out of a tight, corner recently. He was driving, he tells us, an 8 h.p. Burrell road locomotive, hauling a couple of trailers, when the near hind wheel Lif the front trailer left its axle. He got it on again with very little trouble inside ten minutes, and the way he did it is clearly illustrated in the accompanying sketch.
The driving wheels of the engine were first of all securely scotched. The main driving pins were then withdrawn from the near-side rear wheel, and the winding drum was prepared for use. 'The engine was put in reverse, and the cable gradually unwound from the drum, being led rearwards from the machine as it came off the drum, and taken, first of all, over the front axle of the front trailer, then under the rear axle of the same vehicle, over the top of the rear trailer, and finally fastened to the towing hook at the back of the trailer.
The engine was then once more put into forward gear and carefully steamed forward, very slowly, until the axle was lifted to the right height for replacing
the wheel. Having put the wheel on securely the rope was removed, the driving pins replaced, the scotches taken away, and the journey resumed.
A front wheel of the vehicle driven by " S.H.B.," of Stokenchurch, ran over a large stone, with the result that the steering wheel was wrenched out of his hands and the lorry, colliding with the bank, broke the pendant lever on the steering box. It so happened, fortunately, that there was a farmhouse not more than five minutes' walk distant, and there was able to procure a stout ash stick, about 2 ins, thick and 8 ft. long. This he roped to one of the steering levers on the stub axles, and, holding it, was able to steer the vehicle by it, while his mate drove slowly home, a distance of five miles, in second speed.
" P.C.," of Stalybridge, had the mis• fortune to break The frame of his lorry near the off-side front dumb-iron. He mended it, with a piece of wood, in the manner indicated by the accompanying sketch. The wood was cut to shape to fit between the underside of the frame and the top of the spring. It was cut away, as shown, to* miss the bolt on the clip of the spring. There happened to be a spare spring shackle in the toolbox on the lorry, and this was utilized, as shown in the sketch, to couple the two parts of the broken frame together. At its front end the shackle was secured by a bolt which took the place of one of the rivets in the frame, the rivet being removed for the purpose. At the rear end the shackle was secured to one of the bolts holding the radiator guard bracket in place. A satisfactory run from Manchester to Huddersfield was accomplished with the vehicle in the condition shown.
The induction manifold of the engine on the vehicle of Cramling ton, was driving broke right, by the flange which holds the carburetter up, so that the latter was merely held in place by the rods from the throttle control gear and the petrol pipe, altogether not quite the best sort of fastening,
apart from the fact that a good mixture can hardly be expected when there is a gaping crack in the inlet pipe. He got a couple of pieces of f-in. by 1-in, bar, each about 5 ins. Icing, and also two lengths of •166in round bar, which he screwed at both ends. The flat pieces of metal were drilled, three holes in each, one of A in. diameter in the middle and two of A in., one near each end. The frin. bars were made into U bolts, and hung on to the top of the induction main • fold. Their . free ends were passed through the end holes in the flat bars, the centre holes being engaged by the bolts of the flanged joint between the manifold and the carburetter. The jagged edges of the pipe were carefully, butted and the U bolts tightened.
" A.W.," of Barnsley,: was in a bit of a fix recently. He went to weigh a lorry and its z contents, and, getting on to the weighing machine, found that the track of the rear wheels of his vehicle was too wide for the platform of the weighing machine. On examination, it became apparent that the inner tyres of the twins on the rear were on the platform, but not the outer, so that he was able to get out of the difficulty by running the rear wheels on to a couple of pieces of timber. 2 ins. thick
and placed in the way of the inner tyres, which mounted the wooden blocks, lifting the outer tyres clear of the hard road outside tho.platform. " B. B.," of Tinsley, was called out to a lorry the magneto of which refused to function. On arrival he discovered that the small carbon brush at the back of the contact breaker was missing. However, the job was not so much to elucidate mysteries as to get the lorry on the road again, and for this purpose a piece of ordinary, lead pencil was made use of to replace the lost carbon. Thr pencil was trimmed down on the outside until it would just fit into the re cess for the carbon brush ; it was tapered off at one end to a dull point, and at the other the lead was bared for a length of about a sixteenth of an inch. A piece of the spring from the commutator roller of a Ford was then stretched out and made to clip the projecting piece of bare lead.