Passengers in Excess of the Licensed Number.
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THE DECISION of the bench ef magistrates at Neath, reported in our issue of June 26th, in a case where a motor-coach proprietor was summoned for carrying 12 adult passengers and two children in a hackney carriage licensed to carry only 14, has attracted the attention of a large number of coach-owners in different parts of the country, and we have replied by pest to questions put to us front all quarters.
, The •f acts are as stated, the'magistrates deciding that it it not an offence to " carry " passengers in excess of the number. for which a vehicle is licensed provided that they do not sit. The magistrates' clerk remarked that the extra passengers-, if they did not choose to stand, could sit on the floor, but proper seating accommodation in excess of the amount stated in the licence could not be employed without creating an offence. The appropriate section of the Roads Act says that, if the vehicle is used on any occasion. for the purpose of seating more passengers than the • number for which if is licensed, liability for an excise penalty will be incurred. As the Finance Act is a taxing Act, it must be construed strictly. Again, the Ministry of Transport, in one of its circulars to local authorities, in which the question of treating two young children as one adult was dealt with, expressed " the opinion that it is no offence if additional passengers exceeding the number licensed are carried standing.. . -. .
, Buses in the cities and big ,towns cannot be quoted as examples; beeause, in repect of the majority of cases, the highest tax is paid upon them. When the ;schedule tO. the Finance .Act, 1920 and the Roads Act was drafted, it was probably considered that useful correctives to misdemeanours existed in (1) the fact I.hat the hackney carriage proprietor would take out -a licence for the greatest number of seats for which . accommodation .could .-be :made, and (2) the improbability of a passenger standing. in a bus or coach for niore than a: .short distance. That the Acts are rather loosely framed is -at once demenstrated by considering the problem of licensing, for passenger carrying, a lorry with few or no .fixed or movable seats _and , in which .a number of the pa.ssengers sat on the floor Or stood I • The use, by a passenger who was in excess • of the number for which a. vehicle was licensed; of a folding carhp-Stool would, appear: to render the pro„printer of the Not Allowed to Save Money in Licensing. IF THE FACTS are correetly reported to us, the refusal by the Devon Onunty Council to allow the period of a licence Just issued to be extended appears to be unreasonalsle. An owner of a lorry, as the case is stated to us, applied for a quarterly licence for the vehicle from lidsummer to Michaelmas. A -circular which accompanied the licence made it known to the licensee that, by taking out a licence for the half-year to thc er.d of December instead of two quarterly licences. a saving could be effected. The licence was immerl1ately returned to the County Council with an application for its amendment to cover the remainder of the year and a cheque for the additional arn mint accompanied the application. The Council returned the document and told the applicant he must take out another quarter's licence in October. The Council are strictly within their rights, no doubt, for we are not aware of anything in the regulations to require them to alter a licence or a licensing period after the licence has been issued. Nor do we imagine that an application to the Ministry of Transport would be effectual, the probable reply being that the law was as we have stated. But, considering that only four days elapsed between the despatch of the first application and cheque and the despatch of the second, and that the applicant had not been aware of the possibility of saving £2 10s, by taking out a six months' licence, it seems reasonable to think that the Council might well have complied with the request to to amend the licence. The Popular 20-seater. THE POPULARITY of the 20-seater bus in some districts was commented upon a few weeks ago; it now appears that the 20-seater char-abanes can also claim to be the most popular of its kind. A prominent firm of coachbuilders recently told us that, although this has been (die of their best seasons, only two 28-seater chars-à-bancs have been turned out, all the rest being 20-seaters, with the 16-seater nowhere ! The reasons are not far to seek. To begin with, the cost of running a 16-seater is nearly the same ae that of a vehicle with four more seats, so that 20 is the " economic" minimum in most cases. As regards the lasger vehicles, there are many firms who find that a 28-seater is runninghalf empty a large part ofthe time; and, under these conditions, costs are high and the springing is bad. Passengers' comfort is very important, and here the 20-seater scores in many cases, because it is much more often fully loaded. Further, pneumatics can be fitted without prohibitive expense, and the design of a suitable hood is greatly simplified Does the Tractor-lorry Attain Extreme Fuel Efficiency ? APARAGRAPH appearing 'under the heading of " One Hears—" gives publicity to claims to excellent ton-mileage figures per gallon of fuel, which have recently been seriously advanced in our hearing. The type of vehicle which is claimed to be capable of accomplishing 100 to 110 ton-miles to the gallon is the 12-ton tractor-lorry. In connection with one make, we were told that 110 ton-miles had been reached on a vehicle thoroughly well tuned-up and running under favourable conditions; but it was not, said theclaimant, to be assumed that such a figure could be attained by the average user over average roads upon which there was much traffic. The second claim to reach our ears concerned another make of tractor-lorry, and the figure of 100 ton-miles to the gallon was, in this case, quoted. We are satisfied that those who are claiming such low petrol consumptions are honest men, but we feel that harm is likely to be done to the motor and trans 1116 port industries if currency be given to claims which cannot be substantiated. Particularly do we call attention to the need for doing nothing which can mislead the average haulier. He rarely knows what fuel is expended on the propulsion of his vehicle, and so is apt to accept as gospel any figure which seems to justify him in quoting impossible rates. We have looked very carefully into the claims referred to and feel some doubt of the possibility of substantiating them. Taking the specific gravity of the petrol at .75 and a thermal equivalent of 20,000 B.T.T.T, per gallon (both of which will be admitted to be on the high side), the thermal efficiency for one ton-mile per gallon is .002262. Multiplying this figure by 100; we arrive at a thermal efficiency for the vehicle 01..226, or 221 per cent, whilst, if we take the higher ton-mileagefig, u. re Of 110, we get a thermal efficiency for the vehicle of .248, or over 24-per cent. ._ .. Now, the best petrol engine has a thermal efficiency on the bench of about 20 per cent., so that to reach the figure named. the mechanical efficiency of the chassis would have to be well' over 100 per cent., and Euclid used to comment upon such a proposition with a terse " which is absurd." Even at 70 ton-miles per gallon the • efficiency works out at .158, or 15.8 per • cent., and one would be inclined to consider this to be about the maximum value which could possibly be attained in practice. We think it would be extremely helpful if readers would give us their e.xpeidence and their opinions upon this subject. • The Reduction in the Price of Petrol. THE ANNOUNCEMENT last week that considerable reductions have been made in the price of motor spirit came as a pleasant surprise to many users of commercial motor vehicles, and particularly to those who run large numbers of heavy vehicles, the coat of the petrol consumption of which, in the course of a year's working, .amounts to large sums of money. The actual reductions are 30. per gallon tor both No. 1 and No. 3 spirit—equal to 11 per cent. No. 1 is now priced at is. 80., whilst the price of No. 3 is 1s. qd. The amazing feature about these prices is that they amount to only a half-penny a gallon above those ruling immediately. prior, to the war. , It is significant that the drop has not occurred through an increased consumption. The actual amount of petrol imported during the past few months has been conaiderably less than during the corresponding period of last year, and it would appear that the suppliers have been forced to decrease their prices in order to encourage a greater sale. For a longtime past The Commercial Motor and j its associate journals have pointed out that there is every need and justification for the -prices to. be decreased. Cushioning the Passenger Body. • THERE ARE few builders of coach and bus bodies who do not complain bitterly of the great difficulty of producing bodies which will stand up for long periods of service without requiring considerable attention and often an overhaul which, in some cases, may amount almost to reconstruction. The blame for this state of affairs is usually thrown on to the chassis, and not without a considerable measure of justification, for what designer can truly say that his chassis frame will remain rigid in service , over rough roads? Even if the individual sidemembers do not bend, there are almost always torsional stresses which tend—and, usually, successfully —to force these members from being truly parallel one with the other. This lack of rigidity can, however, hardly be laid at the door of, the chassis builders, for, in order to make an absolutely rigid construction would probably entail a weight 'far greater than can reasonably be permitted. Apart from this, some advantages accrue from having a frame which has a certain amount of flexibility, and these may outweigh other considerations. Another complaint of the body builders ia that the springing of the average passenger vehicle is far from ideal, and, quite apart from such considerations as the comfort of the passengers, the vibration which ensues cannot be expected to have other than a very deleterious effect on th whole body of the vehicle. Such complaints, if justified, indicate a pressing need for better Springing of such chassis. There is no doubt that some chassis • which are made to be suitable far. the transport of both goods. and passengers are provided with 'springs which are not nearly flexible enough for passenger service. In several iiista,ncea coachbuilders and others are tak ing the matter into their own hands and introducing means for cushioning the body. In the article which appears in our centre pages We describe two of these methods in detail, and, although they differ greatly in their operation, the object aimed at iS the same, i.e„, the isolation of the body from. twisting stresses and shocks which, normally, are passed through the chassis to the body. In one of the methods described the whole body is actually spring-supported on the chassis frame, care being taken to prevent' undue rolling. In the othercase, the body cross-bearers are supported on each side by steel balls carried in cups. The extremely ingenious arrangement by which these can compensate for irregular movements of the chassis frame can easily be followed by referring to the diagrams which are included in the article.Tags