MOTORING & MOTORISTS

Evening Star, Issue 21743, 11 June 1934, Page 13

MOTORING & MOTORISTS

[BY RADIATOR.]

LIGHTING-UP TIMES To-day ‘J.og Tuesday Wednesday f. 58 Thursday --•••• 7. 08 Friday Saturday ••• 4.0 r Sunday ••• ••• JAMMED OPEN A THROTTLE EMERGENCY • The following story is related of a novice making his first long night run m his new car, f • The night was a perfect one, the car 'was running like a sewing machine, and ihe felt thoroughly happy. Suddenly, as "a short speed burst ended near a sharp left turn, his engine remained accelerated when he released the pedal._ lie Jost his head momentarily, but, fortupately, ' wisdom returned. He declutched, braked, and switched oft. His technical knowledge was . such ■that he had no conception of what was likely to be wrong. In the dim- light he could find nothing amiss, and eventually resolved to start up the engine again, A quarter of an hour later he ’.was still trying to get it going. Then it dawned on his understanding that the tthrottlo was closed to'start, and that it was wide open when it stuck. So he opened the bonnet afresh, identified throttle controls after much cogitation, and waggled them. Something lumped 'loose. It was the long rod to the carburettor. . , ! ■ Nothing further - amiss happenedNext morning the trouble was cured by a drop or two of oil on a dry joint connecting the throttle controls. ; In similar circumstances, however, cause and cure of an, accelerator given to . sticking are not so readily discovered. Jabbing at the foot control, even -if successful temporarily, is not a remedy, and the disorder is liable to return. When -the' accelerator jams the ■best course to pursue is to declutch and switch off (a simultaneous movement), and brake the car to a standstill. The ■control rods should he examined to discover the cause of the trouble. It may be due'to a bent rod. failing at some part of its movement to ride c * ea ' another portion of the mechanism. I 4 reqnentlv the. floor boards arc at fault. In any case the cure is easy when the disease has been diagnosed. THE HEW CAR RUNNING-IN THEIRY It is easv to mu to extremes. For vears past m. m-factiirers of motor vehicles lino warned purchasers to -drive slowiv over the first 500 miles or so'till the engines acre “ rim in.” vestigation, however, proved definitely

Brief accounts of holiday trips, roads, and places of Interest ar# invited for this column.

that more harm could be done by running slow than by running fast, the greatest wear-on moving parts taking place when cold engines were idling than when they were run briskly to warm up. Following on this some papers are advising owners that there is no harm in revving up and driving off on a cold engine, and that it is advisable to drive a new car fast, says a writer. No authority ever advised that a cold engine should be run at very low speed, nor that a new car should be so treated either. Some years ago the manufacturers advised speeds not exceeding from twenty-twenty-five miles an hour on top for a new car, with lower gears treated in proportion. Mow they are advising up to thirty and thirty-five miles per hour tor new cars. . But There has been an advance in the quality of manufacture. Top speeds are higher - i.e., the engines are more efficient —materials are different and there has been a world of improvement in lubrjcation. A cold engine should bo run briskly not raced —till it is warm, and should not be asked to take the load of the car until it is warm; a new, car should be driven at a Jewish speed, not raced and no 1 , dawdled—until the runnjng-m has been effected., The speed required is a speed that will ensure the oil being in such condition that it will circulate freelv and fulfil its purpose. Cars that used to do fifty miles an hour on top were run in at about twentv-five miles per hour. Compare that figure with the following for a oar capable of seventy miles per hour today. The figures are those advised by the manufacturers. First 300 miles 35 m.p.h. Next 100 miles ... ... 45 m.p.h. Next 100 miles ... 55 m.p.h. The following note is attached,:— ‘‘ Never attempt high speed in low gears during this period.” The figures were arrived at after road tests covering many thousands of miles. REHANGING DOORS It is common for the doors of a car to drop after considerable use, resulting in their binding along the bottom sill. Contact at this,point also is liable to cause a heavy thumping, which is often very difficult to locate, as the actual movement is slight, but the area of contact and force is sufficient to make considerable noise. ■■■' If the doors have dropped merely through the screws Holding the hinges having come loose it is an easy matter to tighten them. Should they have torn away from the wood fill up the holes with plugs of glued hardwood driven tightly into the holes, or use larger screws. Frequently, however, somes light distortion of the body framing. or wear of the hinges is the cause, -the screws being quite tight. In such cases the top hinge may be let a little deeper into the wood, or the bottom one packed out with metal or thin varnished cardboard underneath it. The door should swing clear of the bottom sill, but should not he raised so much that it binds against the side posts. Close to the lock of the door will be found a projecting metal tongue which fits into a spring-loaded recess in the post. To maintain silence it is important that this tongue should be kept under steady pressure when the door is closed, which usually means occasional attention to the spring-loaded silencer. Actually blocks of rubber often replace springs. If springs are used the cause of faulty action may be that they have become rusty, when they should be freed with penetrating oil and then kept lubricated, if rubber blocks are used it is generally possible to tighten them when accessary by binding the metal frames in which they fit, after the whole fitting has been removed from the door. To prevent wear and difficulty In closing the doors when these parts are in good condition keep the metal tongue-on the door, the lock, and the hinges well lubricated. Usually rubber blocks are fitted to the door posts to act as buffers. If the door when closed does not bear firmly against these, they should either be replaced or packed out in such a way that it dOfis. " MOTOR " WORDS #* ADDING TO LANGUAGE From the time when the first notorist built his first shed and called it a “garage” (writes 11. A. L., in the ‘Glasgow Weekly Herald’) motoring Ijas been steadily adding to our language, and many of the words which are now in the everyday vocabulary of even non-motorists started life as technical or slang motoring terms. To-day nearly everything that is built on a frame is said to have been built upon its “ chassis,” yet not so many years ago that word was unknown except to the motoring fraternity. Then there are terms which were once applied only to driving actions or difficulties. “ Speeding,” to “ step on it,” “ flat out,” “ cutting in,” and perhaps the greatest difficulty of all, “parking,” are now words which everyone understands. Even more technical terms have slipped slowly out, of their selective use into the commonplace. A “ backfire ” is obviously a word which is readily adaptable to a wider field than motoring offers it, although it is perhaps one of the m° s t important assets of a motor fuel.

Then the roads that a motorist uses now have names which were unknown before the motoring ora. Our great “ arterial roads ” and their Italian cousins, the autostrada, with “ bypasses ” round every big town and temporary “ loopways,” were both unnecessary and unknown when the horse was the main motive power for road vehicles. The very buildings beside the roads —“ filling stations ” and “ road houses ” —are distinct creations which have come into being with the motor ear.

Names, too for users of the highway, mostly of a scoffing nature, have come into existence. vVe have our “ jay-walkers,” and at the other end of the scale the “ road hogs.” Between these two we have “ speed cops ” and “ back-seat drivers.”

Finally there are words which have sprung from descriptions of various types of cars. When the first manufacturer produced a “ supercharged ’ car little did he think he_ was adding a word to our tongue which could be applied to anything of high power, even

the air itself, and nowadays when a proud young husband tells you that thev have just got a new “ baby ” von cannot be certain whether it is a boy, a girl, or a motor ear. PROTECTING WIRE SPOKES ■On cars with wire wheels it is tifficult to use the wheel wrench without scratching the enamel on the spokes. it is worth while padding the wrench with a short length of rubber hose fitted to the first bend. If the wrench slips while in use the rubber strikes the spokes and no damage is done. The idea is particularly useful for pro : tectiug the spokes on cars where the fastening bolts are behind the spokes, but it is equally valuable in cases whore the bolts are located in a large-sized hull. ' DUPLICATION OF BATTERY NOT CURE FIR OVER-DISCHARGE Tu some cases motorists' who have much night driving to do, or whose cars are Used in “outback” country, jump to the conclusion that it might tie wise to fit a second storage battery and so, as it were, have “two strings to their bow,” or, alternatively, a weltcharfeod battery in reserve. A consideration of the elementary electrical facts will show that there is not, as a rule, much to be gained by duplicating the battery whether it is wired in circuit witfi. the original cells or installed separately with a' throw-over switch so that the charging currentfrom the generator can be fed to either battery at will. If the calls upon the cells are such that there is a risk of their becoming gradually discharged, it is obvious that if the recharging current' is divided hour by hour during running time between the batteries, neither will roenvo an adequate charge. But at first sight it would appear that by wiring rile two batteries in 'parallel; advantage could be taken of their joint capacity. It would be impracticable to wire them in series, for in each case the battery voltage would be doubled and become 12 volts in the case of a 6 volt system, and 24 in that of a 12 volt one. The voltage or electrical pressure of each separate cel] of a well-charged storage battery is about 2 volts, and the cells are connected in series; that is to sgy, the positive terminal of one cell is ‘ connected to the negative terminal of the next, with the result that if there are three cells the battery voltage is approximately 6 volts; or 12 volts wheii there are. six cells. But the ampere-hours capacity of the battery is merely that of any one cell. If two batteries of the same voltage are connected in parallel, that is to say. positive to positive, and negative to negative. the effect is that tjie capacity is doubled, but the voltage remains unalt erect.

Thus it would appear that if a second Storage battery Was fitted and connected in parallel with the original battery there would be a much greater' reserve power to draw upon for working the startor-motor and lights. But the catch is that in most cases the car dynamo is not egual to the extra work. One cannot, even theoretically, win back from the cells more electrical energy than has been put into them. The charging current causes certain chemical reactions to occur between the material on the plates and the electrolyte or acid solution. During discharge those processes are reversed, but will not continue beyond what might be termed an equitable degree of chemical reaction. The car dynamo or generator has an output at touring speeds of from 8 to 12 amperes, anc] generally its voltage is rather higher than that at which the battery is rated. It js designed to keep the cells of the standard battery well charged when a reasonable weekly mileage is covered, and the normal output can sometimes he safely- increased by three or four amperes through alteration of the thirdbrush adjustment. But even if the charging rate <an be safely “boosted” to that extent without risk of damaging the generator windings, it is obvious that the increase would not suffice, to take care of a second battery. If each battery is of 50 ampere-hours capacity, and the two’ are wired in parallel, the total capacity is 100 ampere-hours, and it should not l>e difficult to understand that a generator Which was not able to keep one. set of cells recharged, would he still less effective when it was called upon to do twice the work in the same time, CHAHOE CHOICE OF COLOUR The choice of a fresh colour for the wheels of liis car was decided for an Auckland owner as a result of a chance happening recently. At a local sports meeting, one of the competing cars had a wheel damaged, and the driver was able to take part in later events only through the courtesy of a spectator, who loaned the racing man a wheel from his car, which happened to be one of the same make as that which had been damaged. The buckled wheel, for the sake of convenience, was carried back to town on the mounting usually oenpied by the spare, which had been loaned, and it was noticed how wcl) the colour toned with that of the car. More Recently the five wheels of the car have been paipted similarly to those of the racing machine, making a colour scheme both unusual and pleasing. CRANKCASE FUMES In some cars, particularly those in which there is considerable cylinder wear, tho fumes issuing from the breather cap of the crankcase may become troublesome. Several of the latest models have special attachments, whereby the fumes are led off to a point well below the floor boards. It has been found that if the breather cap is discarded and a length of rubber hose attached to the breather pipe, a similar effect is obtained.. The pipe should be so 'fitted that its outlet is below the floor boards and should point towards the back of the car, so that there will be a tendency for the fumes to be readily exhausted because of the air stream present when the car is in motion.

COLLQDIAL GRAPHITE use f6r Running-in period Motorists are thoroughly conservative at heart. Many improvements are perfected years before the motoring public will adopt them. Front-wheel brakes and self-changing gearboxes are but two examples of this. Another innovation, the benefits of which are not yet realised by thousands of motorists, is the use of colloidal graphite in engine lubrication, it must be clearly understood that colloidal graphite does not in any way form a substitute for oil as a lubricant, its function being rather to give oil smoother snrf..ces to lubricate and to assist in spreading the oil, and preventing the possibility of a break in the oil film and a metal-to-metal contact.

The lubricating properties of graphite have Jong been known, but for i any years attempts to use it in petrol engines proved failures. This was (.•’ mcipally because graphite, in it!> natural form, invariably contains a percentage of such abrasive substances as mica and silica, which is almost impossible to remove. A method of manufacturing graphite in an electric furnace from the purest' forms of commercial carbon was perfected, however. This pure graphite is further subjected to a process of oeflocculation, which reduces its parades to a colloidal state. These particles are so fine that they will remain suspended in the lightest mineral oil, and will pass through the pores of a filter paper. HOW IT OPERATES. When added to the lubricating oil colloidal graphite acts principally in two ways. First, it fills up the microscopic irregularities in the bearing surfaces, .bringing them to a high degree of smoothness. In addition a process of absorption into the pores of the etal takes place, resulting in'a “ graphoid ” surface. In this form it cannot be dislodged by. washing with liquid, and nothing short of scraping or filing will move it/ The result is that working parts have freedom of movement with a minimum of clearance. It has been proved, moreover, that “ building-up ’ dbes not take place, and there is no danger of blocked oilways. Secondly, the affinity of graphite for lubricating oil greatly assists it in. spreading over bearing, surfaces and maintaining broken film- Local high -spots, caused by the introduction of small particles of dirt, have little chance in these circumstances of causing a metal-to-metal contact. From this it will be seen that the first and most obvious use of colloidal graphite is in the vital runningin period, when, no matter how good the workmanship, bearings are comparatively rough. This is only one of its uses, however. With comparatively old engines it will reduce excessive play, and will arrest the rapid wear in badly worn bearings. It also provides a method of insurance against damage resulting from a failure in the oil suppjy. Another valuable use is to inix colloidal graphite with ap upper cylinder lubricant, which is added to the petrol. Used in this way it has been found to loosen carbon deposits and scale, and to form such a smooth surface on the cylinder head that it prevents the formation of further deposits. It is, moreover, unaffected by heat. It haS even been used with success in the case of. steam engines to prevent scale formation in boiler pipes. Colloidal graphite With the appropriate oil is also used for lubricating the gears and differential. TWENTY-SEVEN HOURS WITHOUT OIL. An outstanding example of the lubricating qualities of the graphite, which becomes absorbed in the metal of working surfaces, was demonstrated in an experiment made by the National Physical Laboratory. For the purposes of the test a 2in shaft was rim at a constant speed of 500 r.p.m. in a normal white-metal bearing, under a load ol 2301 b a square inch. After a reasonable period' to allow an oil-film to be ■formed, the oil supply was cut off and the bearing allowed .to run dry. Using ordinary lubricating oil, the bearing seized after 36miii. But when a shaft in which colloidal graphite had been thoroughly absorbed was used, no trace of seizure was apparent after twentyseven hours, when the test was stopped. That the value of colloidal graphite is being more widely recognised now is apparent from the fact that several leading motor car manufacturers are using running-in compounds containing it on their standard productions, and are adding it to the lubricating oil used in their test vehicles. " It is obtainable in Dunedin.

O.M.G. LIGHT CAR SECTION FIXTURES v June 16.—Despatch run. October 20, 21, 22.—Labour Day trial.

MOTOR CYCLING FIXTURES June 16.—Social run. June IS.—Annual meeting. CLUB NOTES SOCIAL RUN. On Saturday, Juno 16, the O.M.C. Cycle Section is holding a social run leaving the club rooms at 2 p.m. As this is the final event of the year, all members are invited to turn out and attend this run. ANNUAL MEETING. Members will notice that the annual meeting is to bo held in the club rooms, on Monday, Juno 18, not Tuesday) Jiiue 19, as previously arranged. All members'and friends are invited to attend this meeting. Following the general business, office-bearers for the ensuing year will be elected, and trophies for the past year’s events presented. RUNNING-IN NEW CYCLES The proper method of running-in the engine of a new motor cycle is similar to that applicable to cars, but there are certain differences. Some riders are misled because the engine gives no indication of perceptible tightness, and assume accordingly that high speeds can be indulged in without risk of damage. It has been found in practice that motor cycle engines do not require so prolonged a running-in as do those of cars, but they must receive careful attention, and' be driven considerately for the first 500 miles, at least. Many distributors advocate the use of an upper cylinder lubricant which is mixed with the petrol, and that advice conforms to the opinions of leading technicists. So far as operation of the machine is concerned, the best guide is the amount of throttle used. On

thc level the machine may be ridden at 40 or 50 m.p.h. with a small throttle opening and no harm result, but if the throttle is opened wide to climb hills at speed, the load imposed on the engine becomes excessive if it has not run a sufficient distance to acquire its final working finish.

TOLD AT THE WHEEL FATAL. “ Have you ever had a motor mishap? ” “ Well, I met my wife in a garage! "■