STARTING HANDLES

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 1, Issue 116, 8 January 1932, Page 2

STARTING HANDLES

ONE FEATURE IN WHICH THE MODERNS LOSE "Is there any one feature in which the modern motor-car is inferior to its predecessor of half a dozen years ago?" asks a contributor to "The Autocar." "Yes; it is to be found in the starting handle, or in the substitute for a crank now supplied with even high-grade cars. It is not often that an engine has to be started otherwise than by the use of the electric motor, and cranking is almost a lost art. "During a recent cold spell I happened to be brought into contact with half a dozen cars of different makes on which the starting crank had to be used. The first was a small car with a. eombined generator and starting motor in front, the starting handle going direct on to the end of tlie shaft, without any support. If more than a quarter turn were attempted the starting handle invariably flew out and carried the hand round until brought to a stop by contact with the mudguard. Once my head happened to be the buffer. "On another car the starting dog was rusted in its sleeve on the frame cross-member, and when freed it would not line up with the end of the crankshaft. In another case the substantial bumpers and heavy tubular cross-member made it impossible to do more than exert a very feeble upward pull on the starting handle. A high-priced car had a piece of bent iron as a starting crank, without a sleeve on the handle; as a consequence I had to choose between spoiling successive pairs of gloves or taking the skin off my hand. "The most annoying case was that of a car with a very neat metal pan between the dumb irons, without a hole in it through which to pass the starting handle. To detach this pan it was necessary partially to drive out the front-spring pivots, in addition to removing several metal s'crews. Finally, at one of the shows, I espied a car with a perfectly satisfactory, old-fashioned, business-like, permanent starting handle, kept upright by a clip, but the man who built the body had placed a sheet-metal pan below it so that it was impossible for the handle to drop lower than the horizontal position. "Some day electric starting motors may become so developed that starting handles will never be required. But at present they are needed, if only to free gummy engines on a cold morning; and for this reason alone I ask designers to give a little more attentioh to this now almost forgotten part of the car." du *s. shrd sh sh sh shrdl shrdlu