MOTORS & MOTORING

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2674, 21 January 1916, Page 11

MOTORS & MOTORING

IBy Curron.i A Dangerous Praotico. The dauger of running the engine in tlio garage with the door closed strikingly proved in London, recently. Two moil who had gone into a garago to wash the car kept the engine running without any proper means of ventilation, and they were found the next morning both suffocated. When the engine is running slowly it is usually employing a rich mixture, and a large proportion of cariwn monoxide, included in the exhaust gases, and .when proper ventilation is not afforded it is more than possible than anyone working in tho garage will lose consciousness. Petrol vapour has much the same effect. The victims of the London accident wore found by tlio owner of the car, one sitting at the driver's place, the other on the running board, in perfectly natural attitudes. It is surmised that . the men, at first becoming drowsy, stopped work, and were gradually overcome. At the inquest it was stated that death was duo to carbon monoxide poisoning, jind it was also stated that there were about five gallons of petrol remaining in the tank of the oar, tlio engine itself having stopped through want of oxygen. It is a curious tiling about carbon monoxide poisoning that the victims hardly notice any effects, the first symptoms being a tired feeling which comes over the victims almost imperceptibly. ■'J'lie men, being naturally tired alter their long day at washing cabs, probably did not notice tho effects coming on at all, and. were caught unawares. The warning, therefore, is obvious. An engine should not be run for any length of time in a garage that is not properly ventilated; in fact, it is safer nevor to run an engine jt all in a garage with the door shut. Creasing Detachable Wheels.

The average owner-driver is istingy in the attention he pays to his car; his secret model is the famous philosopher who had just succeeded in teaching his horse to dispense with food, when it died. Very often (says a . motoring writer) he takes the line of discovering what is tlitf minimum maintenance on which the car will run. Consequently, 'owner-drivers are all but unanimous in neglecting their detachable wheals. A light car tyre often runs several thousand miles without a puncture; wlien'at last an air tube collapses, tlie wlieel is firmly rusted home. the naked spare wheel has~lain in its well at-fhe mercy of tho elements, And its hub is full of rust and grit; but as often as not it goes straight ou to the fixed hub without either a . wipe from a rag or a squirt of lubricant. Destiiiy is remorseless, and such carelessness brings its own nemesis. The obvious moral is that detachable wheels should be removed from the hubs once a nionth or 60, and, receive a. film of vaseline, or other water-resisting lubricant. Light car wheels must be par- ' ticularljr. sensitive to such abuse, for their tires, puncture at rare intervals, ■ and their owners seldom keep a methodical chauffeur. Fortunately, Sankey bolts', are more manageable after such ncglect than the ratchet and pawl type of hub common on bigger vehicles; a rusted Sankey can always be knocked off by \laying a piece of wood clean across its rim from side to side, as near ' the hub as possible, and hitting the wood at, say, the fouf and eight 0 clock positions simultaneously. It is a gross blunder to hit a ratchet hub locknut; it: requires sluicing with paraffin and coaxing, or the delicate internal mechanism may be smashed, when tho last state of that wheel is ineffably worse than, the first. If the car -under notice iigoit'boms at all it was probably achieved by leaving the Wheel in 6itu, and transferring tlio spare cover and tube to .it from the fifth wheel. It is equally important to mop off and oil the 6paro wheel huh before fitting it to a fixed hub on. tile axle. ■ Here arm There. . Lighting-up time for motor-cars and motor-cj'cles:—To-day, 7.34 p.m. Next Friday, 7.29 p.m. For the year ending June 30, 1915, America exported no less than 74,000,000 dollars worth of cars. 111 1914 only 38,000,000. dollars worth were exported, so the state of war in Europe has caused the American export tradte in cars to be practically doubled.. . Among the many estimates as to Germany's strength at present is one to the effect that tlie number of motor-cars in civil use. has dwindled from 70,000 <'to fewer than 15,000. In one of the American States, lowa, there is one motor-car to every ten families of the population, the highest average in the world. This is ascribed to the fact that there are no extremes of wealth or poverty in lowa, and the State consists of a large body of persons with average incomes.