MORE HINTS

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 1018, 8 July 1930, Page 6

MORE HINTS

The Care of the Car

FOR CLEANING PLUGS Owners of cars on which the sparking plugs frequently soot or oil up, and cannot be prevented from doing so by ordinary tuning, will find an old wire brush, of the type used for cleaning suede shoes, an excellent device for cleaning plug points. It can be carried in the tool roll, where it is ready for immediate use. TOOL STORAGE IN THE GARAGE I always remove from the car kit those tools not generally wanted on the road, such as the valve lifter, wheel drawer and the very large spanners. I keep these in the garage, for which purpose I have a board 51t long by 2ft wide attached to one wall and sloping down at an agle of about 45 degrees. A raised beading round the edges prevents tools slipping off, and sets of spanners, different sizes and adjustable, etc., lie iu rows on this hoard immediately to baud—each one in its own position for size, so that immediately one is mislaid it is noticed. —A.M. A SPARE-WHEEL LOCK Sneak thieves who make a practice of stealing accessories from unattended cars are generally attracted by the spare wheel. Quite a good method of locking this in place, in those cases where it is secured to the bracket by a long bolt passing through its centre, is as follows: Fix the wheel firmly in position, and then drill a hole of about a quarter of an inch diameter completely through the nut and bolt. Through this eau be passed a small padlock. If a portion of the bolt protrudes beyond the nut, the hole may be drilled through the bolt only, thus obviating any necessity of injuring the nut. TIGHT ENGINE GASKETS A very important point to watch when an engine overhaul has been carried out and a new gasket fitted is the tightening up of the cylinder block holding-down bolts. After some time probably file bolts will have to be tightened, and if the valve tappets have been set very carefully the clearances will be affected even to the extent that valves may not close, with a consequent difficulty in starting. In tact, I know of a case where starting was impossible until each valve tappet had been slacked off. This shows that care must be taken to watch the tappets after tightening down the cylinder block, especially if the final engine tuning has been done previously.