• Home
• Used vehicles
• Product news
• Dealer news
• Compliance
• Buying advice
• Archive

OPINIONS and QUERIES

Oil Engines and Fire Risks. The Cost of Starting in Contracting. Hauliers Must Combine Families Who Want to Travel with their Furniture. Haulage Work for a County Council

The Danger of Fire on the Road.

The Editor, THE COMMERCIAL MOTOR.

[35501 Sir,—It would be of the. greatest interest if operators would put forward some of their experiences in connection with fires during the operation of petrol and oil engines. Of course, I am well aware that there are those who will say that there have been no fires with oil engines, but, as to that, I will say that I have knowledge of many fires at sea and on land in oilengine-driven machine rooms, and that these fires have been caused in many cases by the same factors by which, I hold, fires can take place on oil-engine-driven road vehicles and railway locomotives.

The proper ventilation of this very significant common danger would give encouragement to those who are endeavouring to make things safer and more reliable for all classes of road-carrying concerns, and to improve what I call the breed of all kinds of transportation heat engines.

For many years this danger has been apparent to internal-combustion-locomotive designers, and one of the greatest obstacles which we have to contend with, from a public-safety aspect, is to keep the essential, but dangerously high temperature, securely inside the working cylinders.

There are some people, however, who are inclined to take the risk, but, on the other hand, there are others who, whilst fully realizing, and appreciating, the great and, indeed, tremendous advance which is brought about by the modern application of the old-time " Asiatic " method of compression-ignition for heat engines, do not fully agree that this excellent engine is entirely free from the common fire danger.

The so-called "carburetter fires are in many cases the result of the excessive heat of the exhaust of petrol engines, they are also caused by the almost early Victorian, and indeed dangerous, method of over-lapped valve setting, and in my opinion both manufacturers and operators alike are much to blame for tolerating such dangerous and out-of-date methods, especially when used in engines carrying expensive freights. Besides, the insurance risk will always be high and the rates proportionately extravagant, while such valve setting is used; one never knows when one has to throttle-down, and the resulting slower burning, lowercompression mixture will easily get away to the induction pipe and carburetter, as the inlet valve opens while the exhaust valve is still pouring out its still slowly burning charge.

The relative thermal efficiency of petrol and oil engines, as at present constructed, were very well shown by the interesting curves which you reproduced on page 886 of your issue dated August 11th. These showed very conclusively how superior is the constantcompression-pressure oil engine compared with the variable-compression-pressure petrol engine; they also Indicate, to those who take the trouble to look for this e50 point, the enormous increase in thermal efficiency which may yet be obtained from the petrol engine.

The increasing number of avoidable fires taking place weekly in various parts of the country in motor vehicles travelling the public streets will, I feel sure, in time force the hands of our legislators.

London, S.E.5. WILLIAM P. DHRTNALL.

Capital Needed to Start a Haulage Business.

The Editor, THE COMMERCIAL MOTOR.

[3551] Sir,—Having been unemployed for three months, I have been thinking of commencing as a haulier, as I have had a few years' driving experience. In this district I could obtain various jobs with a lorry, but have very little capital to start such a venture. I have a motorcycle, which I think I could exchange as a £30 deposit on a lorry. Do you think this would be sufficient to start and is there a concern that would allow me to make, say, three or four years' easy payments?

I should be glad to know what and how to charge for work, which would include the handling of quarry stone, coal, cattle, etc., in a rural district.

Pembroke. W. C. GRIFFITHS.

[I regret that I cannot in any circumstances recommend you to go into business as a haulage contractor on a capital of £30, nor do I anticipate that you will find any concern to give you three or four years' credit following an initial payment of that amount.

I should seriously recommend you to stick to your work as a driver for another year or two, and during that time endeavour to collect information about rates and prices. If you do that and then write to me again with that information as a backing, and if you have in the meantime been able to '.vet hold of some more capital, then I may have different advieR to give you.—S.T.R.)

A Combination of Haulage Interests Most Desirable.

The Editor, TEE COMMERCIAL MOTOR.

[35521 Sir,—The writer would like to thank you for your leading article in the issue of The Commercial Motor for October 13th, under the title of "Ruiners, Get Together !" The ease you put is a very' necessary one, inasmuch as the smaller type of haulier (who represents 00 per cent. of local haulage work and a fair proportion of long-distance haulage) is so far engrossed in providing some means, however uneconomical it may he, for keeping his wheels moving.

You suggest, and rightly so, that an individual haulier cannot hope for ultimate success in this period of immense competition unless he stabilizes his connection with some form of organization, whose objects are divested of all ulterior motives, to assist the man who has attempted and is attempting to serve industry in an economical manner. Unfortunately the individual haulier has himself already brought rates down to such a level that he cannot earn a respectable margin of profit or, in fact, any at all.

You refer to long-distance and short-distance hauliers' associations or alliances as being media for collective effort. Is not what is wanted at this stage some kind of executive council representing all road interests, so as to achieve the perfect unanimity looked for in the first paragraph of your leader? Already there are associations covering road-transport interests throughout the whole of Great Britain, each, as it appears to the writer, dealing in a parochial manner with the supreme problems which confront us.

Derby. G. L. ARTLESS.

[The chief difficulty at present would be to induce individual hauliers to join any national alliance. Each section of the industry has its own problems, and it seems to us that these sections must first organize themselves before such an executive .council as you suggest can be formed. With each section in a powerful position there should be no difficulty in carrying the matter still farther, but we cannot have leaders to form a council unless they have followers, and it was in order to encourage such followers that we published our leading article on the subject—En.] Carrying the Family as Well as the Furniture.

The Editor, THE COMMERCIAL MOTOR.

[35531 ,Sir,—We are often asked by customers for whom we are carrying out furniture removals if they and their wives and families may travel on the van with the furniture. We should be obliged If you would kindly let us know the position regarding this practice, under the new Road Traffic Act.

Will you also let us know whether it is correct that carburetters must now be provided with drip trays?

Brentford. J.D.

[There is no objection to your allowing customers to travel in your vans when you are carrying their furniture, so long as you inform your insurance company that you do so and obtain their written confirmation that they will hold you covered under your policy in the event of an accident happening, when the customers are being carried, which gives rise to a third-party claim.

If your policy does not cover your liability towards persons who are carried in your vehicles, then you should make it quite clear to your customers that you can carry them only at their own risk. So long as no charge is made for transporting the customers themselves, it is not necessary that your third-party policy should cover your liability towards them ; but unless you notify the insurance company, as suggested above, the company might repudiate liability on the ground that your vehicle was being used for a purpose which was outside the terms of the policy, or contrary to the replies which you gave when you applied for the issue of the policy.

With regard to your question as to whether carburetters most be provided with drip trays, the position is that paragraph 21 of the Public Service Vehicles (Conditions of Fitness) Provisional Regulations, 1931, dated March 13th, 1931, provides that " all carburetters and apparatus associated therewith shall be so placed that no fuel leaking therefrom shall fall upon any part or .fitting which is capable of igniting it, or into any receptacle where it might accumulate." The regulations apply only to publicservice vehicles, not to those utilized for the conveyance of goods.--Eo.] Tendering for the Haulage of Road Material.

The Editor, THE CoMMERCIAL MOTOR.

[3554] Sir,—We are tendering for the hire of 5-ton hydraulic tipping wagons to Cheshire County Council, and assuming that we have to contend with all the clauses for the above work, we are at a loss to estimate what charges we must ask to secure the work and endeavour to make it profitable.

We may add that there are other contractors about here who are on this work, also different districts have their own contractors, besides county council steam wagons.

We have read your article on the way that the

Western Way Transport Co. handles this class of work, but there are no references with regard to the charges per ton for one to five miles, each load being of a different nature, such as tarmac, chippings and broken stone, nor are the day rates given for those.

We enclose form of tender for your inspection and guidance, so you can see for yourself what the conditions are, and all of them must be obeyed. [This is not reproduced.—ED.1 We are of the opinion that you have seen quite a lot of these, and have helped many haulage contractors-to avoid pitfalls in filling up these forms. We therefore ask if you would be so good as to enlighten us on these subjects. We assure you that for years and years to come we shall always buy The Commercial Motor, if only for the latest news and because you are doing your best for this industry.

Manchester. W.G.C. AND SON.

[The form of contract which has been handed to you by the Cheshire County Council is generally similar to others and there is nothing really objectionable in any of its clauses. So far as rates are concerned I suggest the following :For ordinary materials, nfacadam, chippings, etc.; First mile, is. 6d. per ton; second mile, 1s. 9d. per ton ; third mile, 2s. per ton ; fourth mile, 2s. 3d. per ton ; fifth mile, 2s. 7d. per ton ; sixth mile, 2s. 11d, per ton.

For the tarred materials it is customary to charge about 10 per Cent, more, and reasonable figures would be : For the first mile, 1s. 8d. per ton ; second mile, 2s.; third mile, 2s. 8d. ; fourth mile, 2s. 6d.; fifth mile, 2s. 10d.; sixth mile, 3s, 4d.

For the daily hire of your 5-ton lorry you should obtain from £2 15s. to £3 3s. per day, according to whether it is necessary to employ a mate or not.—S.T.R.] Long-distance Haulage with a 2-tonner.

The Editor, THE COMMERCIAL MOTOR.

[3555] Sir,—As we are just commencing in the longdistance haulage business, we should be pleased to know if you could inform us as to the cost per mile of running a 2-ton Chevrolet from North Shields to Liverpool.

The return journey is, we understand, 306 miles, and therefore two drivers are necessary.

Also we should be very grateful if you could suggest any reliable "clearing houses" in Liverpool, Manchester, Birmingham, Nottingham and London who would be in the position to influence return loads for us.

North Shields. THE B. AND A. CARRYING Co.

[The cost per mile of running your North Shields-Liverpool trip depends largely upon the use which is made of the vehicle during the rest of the week, that is to say, upon its total weekly mileage. The Tables of Operating Costs which have been sent to you will serve to indicate what I mean by that.

If I assume that the vehicle be regularly employed on remunerative work for five days per week, then, taking this single day's work alone, the net cost of operating the vehicle will be 5d. per mile. Please note that there is no provision made in that figure for any establishment charge or profit. Ton must add a proper proportion for those to the .5d. per mile before you can assess the charge you should make.

The following are names and addresses of clearing houses which may be of use to you BIRMINGHAM—Walter Gammons, Ltd., 10, Holborn Chambers, Broad Street.

Ex-Army Transport, Ltd., 21, Easy Row. LIVERPOOL.—Walter Gammons, Ltd., 7, Maxwell House, St. Paul's Square.

Ex-Army Transport, Ltd., 80-83, Drury Buildings. MANCHESTER.—Ex-Army Transport, Ltd., 5, Queen Street.

NOTTINGHAM.—Chamber of Commerce Transport Department, Smithy Row.

LONDON.—Carey, Davis and Thomas, Ltd., 145-9, Kingsla.nd Road, E.2.

Ex-Awny Transport, Ltd., 37, Great Tower Street, E.C.8.

Walter Gammons, Ltd.. 85, Chiswell Street, E.C.2.

Allen Simpson, Ltd., 16, Water Lane, E.C.:3.

—S.T.R.]