Producer-gas Specialists' Promising Supercharger Experiments
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London Automobile Engineers, Devoting Whole Activities. to Producer-gas . Conversion and Maintenance, Base Optimistic Outlook on First-hand Knowledge of Running, Maintaining.
and Installing
0 PINIONS differ on the use of supercharging with producer gas, and there is not much data generally available to afford satisfactory evidence of its practicability or otherwise. We were more than interested, therefore, to learn that a supercharged vehicle, running on this fuel, had covered 23,000 Miles in the service of a London hiScuit manufacturer, Wylie, Harris and Co., 44,
Brewery Road, N.7, '
Evidence that it is regarded by its operator as ' satisfactory is afforded, furtherinore, by the .fact that another of this company's Machine; has just been equipped. with a gas plant, in which a blower is included, whilst its confidence in the practicability of procliicer gas—used either with or withbut supercharging—is "manifested by the presence in its fleet of eight vehicles using this fuel, counting the second supercharged machine.
The first-named is a Gity Vixen, and it was equipped at the outset with a supercharger, which then was not new, It is a Centric,, and was taken from a , . gile3i.., ,ca.r,: .. To . obtain ,,' the , required : capacity, it 'liad-to be geared 'up and suns at 44 tirnes..crankshaft speed. As evidence of the' -good condition that 'it is still in, the statement was made to us that the engine suction: will pull the blower around when -the belt is off.
On the lorry which has just been converted—a Diamond T 5-6-tanner—an Aruott blower is 'used. It is driven by .belt from an additional pulley on the fan-drive shaft. We are inforined that it is capable of maintaining a manifold pressure of 74 lb. per sq. in.
Gas is supplied in the case of the Guy Vixen by a British Gazogenes plant, mounted on a trailer. On the Diamond T a Cowan trailer unit is employed, and the blower is coupled to the pipe line front the .filter, with an Arnott gas carburetter interposed at the-joint.
'A feature `Of this instrument is that the jet of the' petrol carburetter incorporated is provided with a needle that is devised to cut off the flow of liquid altogether. It is operated by a Separate control. In other respects the apparatus is not markedly different from similar types. There are interconnected throttle and air valves, with • a hand adjustrrlent for the latter. The advantage afforded by the petrol needle valveis.that thefoot accelerator control -can be used for both. "gas and liquid fuel Pinning. All the installations to the Wylie Harris fleet have been carried out by Messrs. Harris Garage, of whom the operator is the parent concern. This firm may be correctly described as 100 per cent. producer-gas automobile engineers, their main . function 'being the same as that of any other motor engineer, using the term in the usually Understood sense, except that their activities are confined solely to . gas vehicles.'" They do not undertake. work to machines using liquid fuel, nor supply goods to operators thereof; they self tyres, sparking plugs, etc., only,, for producer-gas vehicles, and install plant,
and service both –plant and. chassis
only of this type.
Private cars, as well as commercial motors, are handled. Indeed, the former at present constitute the bulk of the -rm's business, outside operations in connection With the parent cOnipany's fleet.
The garage is under the control of Mr. C. 0. Palmer, general' Manager, and largely to him goes -the credit for the success' that is being obtained with .producer .gas, not only hy Harris and Co., but also by nurriercius customers operating cars onthis fsiel. Incidentally, .the . Cowan .plant is ,
virtually standardized for private cars.
• We understand that delivery was recently taken of the 150th Cowan plant. Built-in installations andtrailer-mounted assemblies are both offered, in the latter case Ace chassis being employed.
To give an idea of the extent to which: the private motorist is faking to producer gas, we can state that, during the past three or four mouths, Messrs. Harris Garage have been turning out, on an average, no fewer than five conversions per week. They claim to be the only producer-gas firm undertaking Rolls-Royce conversions, • On the occasion of a recent visit, we SiAW in the shops more than half a dozen
cars, including a Rolls-Royce, in course of having producer-gas plants installed, in addition to the Diamond T job, and some 10 producer assemblies in stock, as well.
Mr. Palmer holds strong views on the rpiestion of solid fuel, and voiced some interesting suggestions for its encouragement. He advocates (a) making 25 years the age reserving producer-gas drivers from military service; (b) releasing more petrol to gas vehicles to facilitate incidental operations, like drawing up the fire, or that steps be taken to render more readily available high-speed electric blowers, which are now hard, if not impossible, to obtain; and (c) increasing supplies of solid fuel and controlling the price.
He makes no secret of the shortcomings of producer gas, and is opposed to those who do. He is doubtful as to whether it shows an appreciable 'saving, as compared with petrol, and he regards as indispensable to the attainment of successful results first-class maintenance.
In the last connection, he told us
how, on several occasions, a driver had brought his vehicle back after a few hundred miles, saying, " It ran beautifully at first and now it is hopeless I" And how he had taken out the sparking plugs, sand-blasted them or put in a• new set, and set things as right as before. " They, get a deposit on the inside," he said, " which causes misfiring and spitting, and they must be cleaned—thoroughly cleaned—at Ire
quent intervals. Many of the troubles my customers have had have been due to no more than that, but they blame the plant, the filter, 'the fuel and the producer-gas principle itself, and so-'a bad impression is created."
'.1 Can't the plug people. produce" a model better suited to gas ?" we asked.
Champion have..been very helpful," he replied, ." and I have had pretty good results from this make. I keep20 gross of them in stock."
Questioned as to the fuels he favoidred,he •named Progasite and Rexco, which both retail at £6 58. per ton, and cliarcoal costing £1 per cwt.
He readily admitted that cylinder wear was accelerated by gas, but did not consider this a serious impediment to the fortunes of solid fuel. • He quoted a case of a Bedford, which had shown 0.011-in, wear after 35,000 miles, commenting that that was not an unreasonable mileage between rebores. " Of course," he added, " you must change the oil regularly and often."
An important part ofthe service rendered by his firm centres on instruction, and he devotes special care to training his customers and the drivers of the vehicles in his charge in the proper methods of maintenance and
driving. The information sheets he has prepared and issues' contain real practical advice in easily .assimilated form, and are among the best of their sort. we have seen. •
We departed from our visit to this establishment with the thought that, if private-car owners were willing to do the maintenance jobs, which, it is acknowledged, are dirty and rather disagreeable, then surely there is no justification for drivers of commercial vehicles to jib when called upon to-do likewise.
Furthermore, we are confident that, if the availability Of the services of, Messrs. Harris Garage wcro better -known, more commercial-motor opera tars would use producer gas than are now doing so. In so many cases they 'do not feel eqUipped to cope with the extra work involved and have not on their staffs Men, possessing the special knowledge needed, or with time to acquire it..