Motorcab Topics.
Page 6
Page 7
If you've noticed an error in this article please click here to report it so we can fix it.
News contributions are invited: payment will be mode on publication.
Nzest lIzgistration.
Ihe White Star Taxis, Ltd., with an authorized capital of t3,000 in Li shares. The registered office is at 7, Oldham Street, Liverpool.
Mr. Burns and his Taxicab.
On Easter Monday, in the course of a characteristic visit which he was paying to certain unemployment-reliei works in the East End, Mr. John Barns, who was using a taxienb, was stepped at the entrance to West Ham Park by a keeper, in accordance with the rules under which motor-vehicles are not permitted to enter. Mr. Burns thereupon ordered the driver to ait for Hill outside.
Motorcab Finance in Australia.
Our Australian correspondent, writing on the 23rd February, informs us as follows. ‘. The subscription list for the Australasian Motor Cab Co., Ltd., has now closed, and nearly the entire amount required has been subscribed in Sydney. Melboarne and Adelaide. The response from Adelaide was disappointing, but the other two towns more than came up to expectations. As the amount offered for sllbsuription in London has been oversubscribed, the company will proceed to allotment on its full capital.
" The six earliest motorcabs„ which have been working in Sydney since last July, have earned sufficient money to enable their owners to distribute a dividend of 8 per cent. Considering th12 number of drivers that have had to be taught and the fewness of the cabs, this result may be regarded as highly satisfactory. In the course of conversation with their managing owner re
cently, he stated that the most serious problem e ith which he had to deal was the subject oi' tires. Apart from the very high import duty of 25 per cent., the protruding tram lines, which are the property of the Government, the badly-cambered streets and the terrible condition in which these last are kept, all militate severely against the life of the tires. People desiring to run taxicabs in Australia will do well to rememb9r these points."
When Darracq Meets Charron."
On Good Friday. the drivers of the Liverpool depot Provincial Motor Cab Co., Ltd., held their first annual sports at Aughton. A tug-of-war between Da rra is1 a in I Ch a non drivers was a popular item if an interesting programme: the Harraeq drivers proved to he easy winners. A football mateh which folltiwed. betweeu teams of Darracq and Charron drivers., resulted in a draw of six goals en eh. The evening finished with a " smoker."
Metropclitan Taximeter Regula tions.
Dated the 28th February, 1910, the officially-revised regulations with regard to " the supply and use of taximeters to be used on cabs licensed under the Metropolitan Public Carriage Acts " have now been circulated. As nearly as possible a year ago, a schedule, which corresponded in all but a few respects with the present issue, was circulated by the Commissioner of Police. On that occasion we carefully analysed the regulations, and, in order to save our readers as much trouble as possible, we drew attention te the various new points
which had leAm embodied since the original draft had been made. In the present instance, the upportunit■,has been taken finally to " polish up '' the various recommendations which have been made from time to time, and to embody the whole in a self-contained notice. We may, with advantage, draw the attention of our readers to one or two small extensions of the prior-existing regulations.
In order to allow the manufacturers of taximeters some amount of freedom with regard to the arrangement of the mechanism by which the various interconnections of totalisers end individual-fare records are made, the wording of the paragraphs dealing with this subject has been made rather more elastic.
Another subject, which has, in the past, been the cause of much discussion, is now finally settled. We refer to the record of the effective eircumferenve of the cab wheel which operates the taximeter-driving gear. A new paragraph has now been inserted which states the manner in which this measurement shall be taken, viz., by the distance over which the cab shall move {farina ono complete revolution of the road wheel, when it is in its normal working condition, i.e., presamably, when its tire is fully inflated.
Permission is now officially given to owners to use a new taximeter in the place of a defective one, during such time as it is impossible to secure an appointment wth the local passing station for the repair inspection.
When a new type of taximeter is submitted to the National Physical Laboratory for inspection and approval, it is now provided that a 'capable representative must not only be in attendance, blit must also, if necessary, be prepared to demonstrate the action of the mechanism to the examiners. The only other point which it is e,f interest to note occurs in the °curse of the paragraph which deals with the tolerances which are allow able during the test for accuracy of the whole of the taximeter mechanism. In the case of instruments which are for use on horse-cabs, the instrument shall be so adjusted that " the mileage charge shall be at the rate of 6d. for not less than one mile nor more than one mile 76 yards." In the previous draft regulations this maximum tolerance was 100 yds. more-176. The corresponding regulation for motoreabs still reads "for motoreab taximeters, the mileage charge shall he at the rate of 8d. for not less than 1 mile nor more than 1 mile 117 yds."
Motored b Topics—con.
'the record of the long life of a Dupe lop pneumatic tire, which was fitted to a taxicab belonging to Mr. F. H. Carter, of 43, Horseferry Road, S.W., has been sent to us. It was fitted in May, 1909, and it has run [0,1100 miles without a puncture. This tire is on exhibition at the Dunlop Co.'s establishment in Clerkenwell Road, E.C. Zurich's Preference for Electric Cabs.
A foreign correspondent writes to us that the itrich Corporation will grant no further concessions for petrol cabs, on the ground that the electric variety. while being " quite es efficient," can he run without the concomitants of " stench and noise." Spring will see the first electric cab running in Zurich, and it is expected that petrol cabs will have been wholly tabooed by 1915. Certainly, if a petrol cab cannot be worked without stench and noise," public interest demands that it should disappear, but neither of these nuisances Is observable in connection with any good type of modern mote:Tab. Touching efficiency, it is to be betted that the electric vehicle will pay better in Zurich than it has in Berlin.