NOTES.

Press, Volume LXIII, Issue 19149, 4 November 1927, Page 4

NOTES.

Eight ruby reflectors studding a luminous danger sign in the Auckland Domain, flash back a red light when caught by the headlights of ears approaching the corner. This new and novel type of sign was put up the service officer of the Auckland Automobile Association recently at the bad double bend near the Stanley street entrance.

The Hawke's Bay Automobile Association have advised the Auckland Association that Beatson Park. Hastings, is probably the best motorist camping ground in"the Dominion, and has suggested that motorists be directed to the park as the most suitable camping ground in the district.

The Danish teetotal societies recently held a meeting at which a resolution was passed demanding abstinence for anyone who worked in the service of public motor traffic. They also demanded that private motor-car drivers should be forbidden to partake of alcoholic drinks within a certain time before driving.

Perhaps what may prove the outstanding development of 1927-1928 models will be the application of free-wheel-ing devices to motor-car gear-boxes. The "Autocar" has already described two clever inventions on this line, the Joseph and the Humfrey-Sandberg. Both these devices eliminate any possible trouble in changing gear, even to an absolute novice.

A "motor hotel" of the sky-scraper variety, 29 storeys high, and affording accommodation for 1050 cars, is to be erected in New York by the Kent Automatic Parking Garage, Inc. The plans include modem automobile "laundry," space where owners or chauffeurs can make their own minor repairs, a l&rge chauffeurs' room and waiting rooms. No cars will be stored on the ground floor, that being devoted solely to their reception and departure. The customer will merely drive in, shut off his engine, receive his check and leave. Then, until he himself restarts his engine to drive away, the car is never moved by its own power, all handling and parking being done by electricity—an excellent idea.

However good the condition of the bodywork, it is at the engine that the prospective buyer of a second-hand car first looks. Therefore, it will pay the owner to keep the "works" as clean as ho can and to be prepared for tho day when he wishes to dispose of his car. A marvellous improvement in appearance can be wrought if all the rust, oil, and paint arc cleaned off the cylinder block, and, after adjusting or renewing the radiator connexions, tightening oil and fuel pipes and so on, the. block is given a couple of coats of good quality liquid stove polish.

Municipal authorities in Great Britain use omnibuses very extensively, either to supplement trams or to replace them. According to recent statistics published- by;'' Transport, '..'■ over sixty public bodies run bus services, the total number of vehicles employed being about 1600. The popularity of pneumatic tyres is shown by the fact that more than half of the buses are so equipped. Tho largest undertaking is that at Birmingham, whose fleet of 167 buses carried forty-three and a quarter million passengers in the last year.

A motor so small its rotor could be wrapped up in a postage stamp is used by the Wes:tinghouse and Manufacturing Company, Bast Pittsburgh, Pa., U.S.A., for timing the OB watt-hour meter demand register. It is the smallest synchronous motor .ever manufactured for practical use. Four million of these complete motors, together with their reduction gears, would be required to balance a large 8000 h.p. motor recently built in the Westinghouso shops. The diameters of their shafts are in the ratio of 512 to.l. The rotors are still smaller in proportion, as 37 million are required to equal the weight of the large one. While two men, one on the other's shoulders, could stand upright in the circular opening of the rotor in the 8000 h.p. motor, the rotor of this motor could be worn, set in a ring, on a man's little finger. •