MOTORING MATTERS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 11 January 1940, Page 8

MOTORING MATTERS

SOME PECULIAR FACTS. A certain well-known sage once remarked that "Truth is stranger than fiction,” by which, of course, he may merely have meant that it was rarer. However, there are many true things about motoring which sound surprising to most motorists unless they are highly well-informed and have unusually retentive memories. For instance: — The first motoring competition ever held was as far back as 1887. It was organised in France by a M. Fossiei, of the journal “Velocipede.” Competition was not very keen; only one cai started—and that was a steam-driven tricycle ridden by the famous Comte de Dion. In 1894 "Le Petit Journal” staged a much more ambitious affair which attracted no fewer than 102 entries. When it came to the race day only 26 turned up. The entrants had to fill in details of the machines, mentioning the methods of propulsion. As most of the entries existed only in the fevered imaginations of their inventors, some of these methods of propulsion were distinctly odd. There were cars driven by gravity, compressed air, the weight of the passengers, multiple systems of levels, pendulums, pedals, and hand levers. One car was described as being “automatic” and another as “self-acting.” Mr Henry Ford was. once a racing driver, and broke the world’s land speed record on Daytona Beach with a car of his own make. In using up a gallon of petrol a car engine produces about a pint of water. The length of life of the parts of a modern car is little short of a miracle. In a year’s running of. say, 10,000 miles, the electric starter is used at least 250 times, the brakes are on for about five hours, and the clutch is pushed in and out over 2,000 times. The hub of an ordinary wire wheel does not support the rim. This is hung on the wire spokes from the top of the wheel, so that when the wheel turns the top spokes are in tension and the bottom spokes in compression. “Petrol" was the trade name given to the refined liquid produced by Carless, Capel, and Leonard Ltd., in pioneer days. Americans, of course, call petrol gasoline and paraffin kerosene. They also call windscreens windshields, wings fenders, dicky seats rumbles, bonnets hoods, and top-gear driving is called riding in high.

Dr Diesel, who invented the Diesel oil engine, disappeared mysteriously off a cross-channel steamer just before the 1914 war. His financial affairs were found to be chaotic. In a 12-h.p. touring car travelling at 40 m.p.h. the pistons move up and down the cylinders at 18 m.p.h. Each piston has,to stop, reverse, and restart at the end of each stroke about 5,000 times a minute. The tyre treads of a record-breaking 300 m.p.h. car are thin as paper. Heavier treads would be flung into the air by centrifugal force. The ordinary internal-combustion petrol engine is only about 20 per cent efficient. The steam engine is worse, being only a quarter as efficient. The fiejd gun is only a form of in-ternal-combustion engine. The explosive charge acts like the petrol air mixture of a car engine and the shell acts as the piston.