Cycling and Motoring Notes.

Horowhenua Chronicle, 2 July 1915, Page 3

Cycling and Motoring Notes.

4 From the Dunlop Rubber Company of Australasia, for the week ending 26th Jurne, 1915. '******•# The English will be received in France with enthusiasm, and we are arranging that hotels will be open In all interesting districts. Need we say that tlie hotels will only have French managers, French servants, and French cooks Except of course in the military zones, where it is impossible to travel either iby road or rail, the railways are working practically as m time of peace. Certain formalities have to be gone through for the use of cars, as well as for long railway journeys, but.we are in direct communication with the various authorities, and all the necessary measures are being taken to simplify these, and to render them as little onerous as possible in the existing circumstances. The reports we have received state that, generally speaking, the roads are in good order. In addition to the usual pleasures obtained from a stay in I ranee our guests will, to their great satisfaction, 1 ail to meet with the AustroGerman element, and will continue to encounter the traditional kindness the hearty French welcome, and taste the far lamed French cooking to which they have been previously accustomed. Finally we wish to state that we shall oe at all times only too pleased to assist all who wish to come on a visit, and be . well received in ouu* "Belle France". •' -a- • .ft. « * • * • Every motorist," ' whose car ie - fitted with wire wheels, and particularly the man who is owner, driver and mechanic rolled into one—would have a sigh of relief if the advantages of the wire wheel were unaccompanied by any drawbacks. The former are so undoubted tomt few 'Would care to dispense with the wire Avheels on any account. But in two respects they do tax one's patience at times. One of these, none the less, could easily be cured if tyre manufacturers would rise to the occasion. No experienced owner fails to go round the i rims periodically in order to see whether the security bolts are tight; but in the case of a wire wheel, the butterfly-nut is sometimes wedged between two spokes and cannot easily be turned. This applies of course to wheels of relatively small diameter, and the difficulty could easily be met if tyre makers would tit nits with smaller wings, instead of as appears to be the case, using' a uniform size for all types of wheels. Tlie real outstanding diflicuty however, is that of cleaning. When one comes home after a wet drive it takes as long to clean a set of wire wheels as to go over the whole body work and other parts of the chassis. Occasionally one sees wire wheels, fitted with celluloid discs, buit they are not yet in'common use, and consequently there is not enough accumulated experience to show whether they are satisfactory or otherwise in practice. The whole question, however, is one that deserves liiore attention than it tappears to have received up to now, for many people order artillery wheels, for the sake of convenience, who are, nevertheless Convinced- of the mechanical superiority of the tangent type.