10
MOTORING NOTES
SMALL CAR COM- FORTS.
HOW TO EXTRACT THE VERY LAST OUNCE.
[BY JOHN PRIOLEAU.]
It has. often happened to me to write enthusiastically on the charm of the modern small car, that efficient and faithful servant of the man of moderate means, I give way to nobody in my admiration for it when it is of good class and work. manship, but it has certain obvious drawbacks which until now I thought were beyond cure.
The most obvious of there is, of course, the fact that it is a small car-I mean shall in accommoda. tion. Try na you may, it really is not easy to take more than three people for a tour with even a mode. rate amount of luggage in a small four-senter, and if you are honest with yourself you will admit that two passengers really complete establishment."
|
(CONTD.)
INDIA TO BURMA
BY CAR.
NEW RECORD.
MOTORING NOMADS IN
SINGAPORE.
THE HONG KONG DAILY PRESS, WEDNESDAY, JUNE 6th, 1928.
SINGAPORE, May 29th. The first mets to attempt an England-Australia journey by car, and the first to have taken a car overland from Calcutta to Rangeon, arrived in Singapore on May 28th. They are Messrs. Francis Bartels,
well-known the
Australian ex- plorer, and Mr. P. E. Stollery, a young Canadian, and they have taken seven months to cover 13,300. miles.
The crossing of the Naga, Hill, south of the Tibetan border, was a magnificent achievement, and that and other incidents in their journey are related in a Straits Times in- terview published below.
The outstanding fact about the journey is that Messrs. Bartels and 'Mr. Stollery have taken their car
overland from Calcutta to 'Ran- ̈ I think I have found out how to make the best of a really small four. goon, a distance of 2,500 miles. Beatedly car. Frankly, it is nearly This is the first time that that useless in the ordinary way for full. country has ever been orcased by w grown people to hope to make more
car, and probably by a wheeled of it. (comfortably, I mean) than vehicle of any description. The what we used to call a chummy; great barrier is the Naga range, that is to say, a comfortable two-lying south of the Tibet border..
seated car with one comfortable seat, behind. Only pygmies can really be comfortable in a small four-seater with fixed seats on a long journey-and all the best small four-seaters to-day are meant for long journeys.
30 Miles In 28 Days.
On both sides of this range, in Assam and Upper Burma, the going is comparatively good, but the range itself is only crossed by a foot or camel path, and the Indian Survey Department" and other The two-seater with the dickey I authorities assured the two adven- have always considered to be in reality a form of coachwork for alturers positively that no car could big car. Very few dickeys as they be taken over it. However, they are made to-day are of the slightest crossed it, covering 30 miles in 28 use. In most cases a dickey seat.is a modern stool of repentance, and is the opposite number to what is called in household furniture an oc casional-table-it can only be used ocensionally.
day, and it would be difficult to find a finer, fent of endurance and perseverance in motoring history. Mr. Bartels' reputation as explorer stands very high in Aus- The "Comfy" Three-Seater. My plan with a small chussia-saytralin, and he can fairly claim to with 8ft, din. wheel base-would have seen more of that continent be to have a four-seated body, but to insist upon having the two front seats separately adjustable, running on lines over a really long range. This would mean, of course, that the car will not be a genuine four seater, but it will be, I think, reasonably comfortable three-seater. Having fixed the position of the driving seat, you can then really make the most of the remaining Available space. If there are three of you it will generally be found that
He
than any other living man. He has bicycled around the continent, and he is the holder of the trans continental motoring record. claims to have crossed the con- tinent over seventy times, and for the past twenty-two years he has been wandering in its rast unex plored areas by car and bicycle.
October 20th was the date on
a quite unexpected amount of leg | which Messrs. Bartels and Stollery room can be arranged for by pushing
the seat beside the driver right, foret out from London, and no more ward. In most of these new little striking proof of twentieth century cars leg room under the dash has | progress. culd, be found than the been most satisfactorily increased fact that Capt. Bert Hinkler, who in comparison with former years, and the driver's companion cap usually sit much further further than you would think.
With the two seats independently arranged in a sensible way, you will find that your quite small four- senter really becomes comfortable than even the very best of two- seaters with dickets or any four seater with fixed seats. The vacant space on the back sent will hold any amount of gear, and in some cases quite a considerable quantity of luggage can be disposed inside the body without getting in anyone's
way.
saw them off in London, took six- ten days to complete by air the journey which is taking them seven months. Their route lay through France, Germany, Yugo-Slavia and Greece. They had intended to go. through Turkey, but were advised not to do so, sad from Greece they took ship for Alexandria, and motored through Egypt, up into. Palestine, across, the Sinal desert into Syria, and wid Iraq, Persia, and the North-West Frontier into India
Another advantage of the slidingThey travelled south to Delhi and seat which has become very obvious Calcutta, and in the latter city an lately is the easier entrance it gives nounced their intention of crossing you to your car. Your little four overland into Burma. Againat Beater car can be one of the most strong and authoritative advice monstrously difficult things to enter they held on their way, travelling or leave that has ever been devised, north to the Brahmaputra and and the properly designed sliding across the Naga Hill, fato Upper From there they went acat arrangement has come as a real Burma, blessing to us. Before attempting down to Rangoon, and set out over- to get into the ear you 'push back land to Bangkok. When they reach- the seat as far as it will go and find ed the Siamceo border, however, that instead of a gymnastic crawl heavy rains set in, making it im- being necessary to get in, barking possible to proceed further, and your shins on the dash and catching they turned back to Moulmein, your foot between the edge of the from which point they went south cushion and the door, you can get to Mergui. in and out almost in a reasonable
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BLACK MAGIC.
BARON UNMASKS A COLONEL.
SUSPECTED EXPERT BEATEN LIES IN THE GERMAN BLACK
TO DEATH.
BOMBAY, India.
Colonel Kaldrack of saying one thing in court and exactly the op posite in private.
Misplaced Condence,
The most remarkable of Messrs. of cheer hard slogging that brought. eventual success passes belief. The. Bartels and Stollery's achievements
car was loaded with 120 gallons of is, of course, the crossing of the
It was the ancient petrol, and the spare tins had to
Herr Judge," shouted, the Naga range.
-ARMY TRIAL.
baron, rising from his place, "I trade route from India to Burma be carried up the slopes, together. that they followed, and they found with over hundred pounds of
should like to explain why the KILLING OF " TRAITORS." well-defined foot track, but it was equipment. Mr. Bartels estimates
colonel's memory is so bad. I had Change In Programme.
only used by coolies, and it pre- that they walked at least ninety
a talk with him in the corridor. BELLIN A strange story of the alleged Here they struck the beginnings sented, incredible difficulties to miles during this month, and they
and he said to mo: Yes, we dril Among other things that would be of the monsoon, and with, the heavily laden car? From Manipur Lived on practically nothing but exercise of black magic, which ra Who is telling lies at Stettin 1 found to add to your comfort in a bullock cart tracks they were fol- on the Indian side to Tamu on the rice. The Nage hillmen were sulted in a fisherman being killed, That is the question which inconsider the men of the Bossbach. small car is a flexible wheel or towing hopelessly flooded they had Burmese side is sixty miles, and friendly enough but they gave no was told in & Bombay court, when terests Germany far more than the Brigade soldiers, but I cannot say
that in court.” ' better still, one which will hinge forward, giving you at least an extra option but to travel from of that distance thirty miles is assistance, and the work of carry four men were sentenced to various fate of Lieut. Beines and seven
terms of imprisonment. other members of the Rossbach or Up shot the colonel, red in the six inches of space through which Mergui to Penang by ses. That rough mountain country. Climbing ing baggage, handling the car,
ganisation who are being tried face." Oh! Oh! Oh! Badungen !" change of programme rankles with the range was a terrific task. The spitting the huge boulders that. The four men, it was stated, there for the murder of a comrade ho shouted in diamay Mr. Bartels, however, and be pro track nigzagged up the slopes at blocked the path or building up suspected the fisherman of being an
** Aik Lieut. Schulz, who WES boon, as in most small cars having mines to come back again and find such angles that all sorts of devices the path around them, had to be expert in black magic and the art possible betrayal of the secrets of with me," replied the baron.
named Schmidt, to prevent his centrally disposed gear..and brake
out whether a car cannot be taken had to be used to get the car round done by the two adventurers them of invoking evil spirits, and that the Black, army to the representa Now come here, Herr Lieu- levere it is as often as not prac from Rangoon to Singapore by the comers. Sometimes the rear selves. The highest. altitude reach he thereby brought a lingering ill- tically impossible for the driver to
axle had to be jacked up and the ed was 6,000 feet, and the grades ness on the wife of one of them tives of the British and their tenant, said the judge. And the
Allies.....
young man stood up and declared reach his seat except through his road...
After staying in Singapore a few car pulled forward by a горе were extremely bad, some of them This mas proclaimed through his own door. And under this head days they will go on-to-Balavier fastened to a tree The motoriste having to be taken at full speed village that whoever let lois evil The point at present in debate that Baron von Bodungen wa comes also the advantage of motor across Java to Sourabaya, put in a hard twelve hours work a owing to the loote nature of the spirits and brought illness on his is Did the army recognise the right her video gear and brake levers hinged,
and take ship, again for Port Dar day, and even so they made less surface.
red to purple: He shouted These are a few of the thing win. They will then commence a than a mila on some days. Some 4: The can being used for the wife should stop it, or he would Rossbach Brigade as part of its The colonel had changed from
come to grief the next day, organisation 1
The regular officers present say hysterically I have been: 34 which can be done quite casily, and not too expensively, to make the 3,500 mile journey to Melbourne, situations were so difficult that a journey is 14 h.p. Bean, fitted the following day the four they did not, and deny the state years in the Ariny, Everybody
vid Queensland and Sydney. The gain of six inches was a matter of with Dunlop tyres and using On, small, four-seated car a far more
Castrol Oils, Mesara Bartels and accused men asked the fisherman to ment of the other side that they must admit that I have always comfortable vehicle for long jour-rst part of the trip will be rough rejoicing.
Living On Rice,
Stollery, however, are not being stop his practices, but he replied ordered Colonel Bossbach and his served faithfully. I have taken an oath, Is it gentlemanly to get me neys than it usually is now. Per going, but Mr. Bartels is familiar with the territory through which
financed by either of these com that he knew nothing about evil officers to kill traitors.
In the course of a heated debate, on the thin ice? No officer fights haps a reader will give me his ex- they will have to pass.
panies, and are making their own | spirits He was then, assaulted
Baron von: Bodungen accused like that I' with sticks and killed." arrangements. periences with these or any other dodges1-Evening Standard,
(Continued on next Columa).
A month was spent on this dis tance of 30 miles, and the amount