GEAR CHANGING.

Press, Volume LXIII, Issue 18905, 21 January 1927, Page 5

GEAR CHANGING.

SOME HINTS AND SUGGESTIONS. Difficult -ear changing on a car which has alwavs been easy on wbicn tt change gear generally comes about 1:1 the ease of those vehicles winch have a right-hand change, especially amongst the older types of cars. It is often due to Ihe jamming of the sleeve which carries the hand lever at one end and the selecting lever inside the -ear-box at the other. Sometimes there, are two sleeves—one outs-oe the other and both oscillating upon a central rod—the second s!eeve being toi the brake. These sleeves require to be kept clean and well oiled, because the driver has not only to rotate the sleeve around the shaft or other sleeve to change the gear, but. in selecting the gear—getting across from one side of the gate to the other—he has to bodilv slide the sleeve alon?. the lever being of son:© length, the movement of the hand at end of the lever has a'tendency to bend the sleeye, and if it is drv or has dried oil caked inside it. will bend and bind before it v ill slide. The sleeves should bo kept verv clean and well lubricated. It is of the greatest advantage to squirt paraffin oil into the lubricators and work the lever and the sleeve so that : t oscillates around the shaft and has a reciprocating movement alongit. This will have the effect' cf thinning the congealed lubricant and making the whole work easily and freely, aivl gear changing will avcain become free, easy, and pleasant, instead of hard, jerky and uncertain. In the case of the gears which have a central control this treatment is not required. These levers and bars "are better designed to cork with little attention, for there 1* not the risk of bending and jamming as in the case of the side control of some ears, and the whole roeehanism is fully included in the lubrication of tne gear-box. A little periodical attention to the cleaning and lubricating of these side control pear lever sleeves will have a most useful effect in venting the gear changing becoming difficult and uncertain.