Contributions from Drivers and Mechanics.
Page 21
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TEN SHILLINGS WEEKLY for the Best Communication Received, and One Penny a Line of ten words for any
thing else published.
Drivers of commercial-motor vehic.es and tra:tors, and mechanics and foremen of garages or shops, are invited to send short Contributions on any subject which is likely to prove of interest to or readers. Workshop lips and smart repairs ; long and successful runs ; interesting photographs : all are suitable subjects. Send a post-card, or a letter, Or a sketch to us—no matter how short, or how written, or how worded. We will "knock it into shape" and prepare sketches, where necessary, before publication. The absence of a sketch des not disqualify for a prize. When writing ifie one side of the paper only and men!ion your employer's name as a guarant:e of bona fides. Neither your own nor your employer's name will be disclosed. Payment will be made immediately after publication. Address your letters to The Editor, THE COM M LRCIAL MoToa, 7.15. Nosebery A venue; London, E.C.
An Adjustable Lapping Tool.
The sender of the follow-17w communtcatton has been awarded the 10s. prize this week.
TOBY " (Cardiff) writes :—" The following tip. may be of some use to the readers of your interesting pages:—
" For lapping out gudgeon-pin bushes, steel bearings and similar parts, it is, as your readers will know, common practice to use a lead or copper lap, but
these are not always obtainable just when they are wanted. I have frequently made a cheap and efficient lapping tool in the following manner. I obtain a piece of tube, of either steel, iron or brass, of a diameter of about in. smaller than that of the hole which I wish to lap. A saw-cut is made in one end of this piece of tube, as shown in the sketch, and inside the slot that is thus made, I insert one end of a strip of emery cloth with the business side outwards. The cloth is then wrapped round the tube until it attains the diameter of the hole to be lapped. The opposite end of the tube is then either held in the chuck or between the lathe centres in the usual way. As the emery wears away, the diameter of the lapping tool can he made larger by drawing the paper out through the slot in the tube, so as to leave more on the outside. This, I think you will agree, is a simple and ready way of constructing a lapping tool with an adjustable diameter."
From a Candid Friend.
[879] " S.C." (Glasgow) writes : -" I should like to make a few pointed remarks concerning the ' D. and M.' tips and the accounts of repairs that appear in your columns every week. Nine-tenths of the communications which have reference to tips or are in the nature of accounts of repairs made on the road, or in the shop or garage, are valueless, beyond their interest merely as extra-fine samples of ingenuity, such as are exercised every day in operative engineering.
Some of the tips in particular involve the loss of many hours of working time, because of the necessity for making some extraordinary tool or gear. Such loss might be justified if there were, for instance, much duplicating work to be done, but, on the whole, it would not be permissible. It is also questionable whether in many cases the foreman or the master would be sufficiently confident in his assistant's ability successfully to carry out many of the clever ideas which are suggested. Some contributors, too, describe repairs that are important on the road, but which necessitate the use of some extraordinary piece of material or other. These aids, as a rule, are at hand by the merest chance. Because one man finds that his ingenuity enables him to repair a steam boiler with the aid of an old sardine tin, it does not follow that every driver who is in a similar fix has a sardine tin in his pocket. As training for the mind of an ingenious mechanic, undoubtedly the reading of these various descriptions is commendable, but for practicability I suggest that many of them are of small use to the reader. A clever mechanic will, as a rule, when he is in a fix, endeavour to use some common or garden article that is likely to be found in any ordinary shop or to be carried on the road on an ordinary motor vehicle. He cannot, as a rule, give much time to elaborate contrivances of which he may have read. A tip, to be of value generally, must be simple and expeditious. A mechanic in most cases must consider the time he has to spare, and if, in an emergency, lie should recall a 'D. and M.' account of how a difficulty which is troubling him has been overcome by some of his fellow readers, it is quite likely that be will not have the same time or the same aids at his disposal.
"I hope you will believe that I make this criticism in all good spirit, and merely that some contributors may be set to think about the matter, and may bring forward tips and accounts of repairs which may seem quite ordinary, but which undoubtedly are likely to be of more value to your readers than the freak performances which, although they read well, are very often too extraordinary to copy."
We are always glad to Five publicity to criticism when it is offered in this spirit. While we agree with our contributor that, from time to time, our correspondents describe quite extraordinary repairs, we consider that an account of them is of value, not only because of the individual performance, but because they more often than not indicate alternative methods of overcoming difficulties.—F.D.]