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GOOD DRIVING
Qualities Needed At
The Wheel
The first essential in the mare up of a good driver is a short "reaction period"—that is, the minimum time-log between vis- wallsing any need for action and For the taking of such action example, the average delay be- tween reaising the necessity to sop and the actual application of the brakes is one and one- :th seconds, according to ex- pert opinion and spécife tests, whilst a time-lag of three-fifths of a second stamps a driver as fed to develop into an ex-
The difference of three- · fifths of a second between me- diocrity and genius looks ex- On the tremely slight on paper. road, assuming first-class brakes," It implies that the fire driver will allow his car to run or for about twelve yards (at 40 m.p.h:3 brakes, applies his before he whereas the average driver may same forty yards at the run
before he actually com- speed mences to brake his car. This in turn shows that the nhe driver will have his car stationary at a average man where the point
will still be travelling at 28 m.p.h. We can thus picture two cars travelling in opposite direc- tlons at 40 mph. aplece with no to avoid each other by tram "first-class men they will stop
the action suggested by the re- ceived sensation. To some of us the sensation will always arrive slowly; but we can undoubtedly Curtau the time required to re- spond to the sensation and im- prove the effectiveness of our re- sponses.
the
Of equal importance to driver is a vivid imagination. The stelld motorist will always credit other traffic with the best to img- intentions, and be slow agire that a familiar field gate is tor once open, or that an i- nocuous-looking hedge may screen a lane. The imaginative driver will travel the roads in the mead cf a Red Indian or the warpath in enemy territory or of a big-
hunter
tall threading
Moreover, such
game
elephant grass. Imaginative powers
are com- paratively useless unless they are task in the concentrated on haut. It is for this reason that mariners discourage intercourse with the man at the wheel and that mater-'bus companies late their drivers.
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CONCENTRATION
so-
Lack of concentration always threatens the professioral. If he be motor-coach driver, he travels the same route many times a day, and his job encour→ dead practically bonnet to ben-ages him to exist in an atmo net. but if beth-are handles by. men they will coildet ordinary whilst both are still moving at 28 m.ph.. and the crash will be equal in violence to a moving car hitting a stationary car at 56 m.p.h.
The whole process is of course, absurdly oversimplified in this bald "lustration. Quite apart Inevitable time-lag, from the
an
sphere of the expected. But It is usually the unexpected which provokes
accident, and he must therefore resist the attitude of mind which anticipates only what is familiar. The pleasure traveller is under no such obsession. He Is per-- haps touring Cornwall, and the whole point of his journey is an atmosphere of the unexpected. He is thus much more likely to be
which is innate in us all, and probably is not appreciably sub-prepared for the unexpected if ject to practice or training, the skilled and experienced driver
timme additional
171 wastes no
His reac- deciding what to do.
perhaps one. period 15 tlon second; and at the end of this. time-lag he automatically and Instantaneously acts, whether by The or by stopping. swerving
further time in novice waste "remembering" which controls be "must operate to secure the neces- 'sary effect. Thus, if a car skids. the Are driver works off his in- evitable time-lag and then steers Mis takes off skid. into the brakes, and so on. while the his novice, after exhausting
his time-lag. possibly appites
the brakes still harder steers wrong way, or even lets go of the steering-wheel and behaves bielo- lessly.
AUTOMATIC ACTION
So far we have seen that unti
furnished experience nas
窳
con-
It should sudderly assume an un- pleasant Or perilous shape. Nevertheless. he should sternly avoid distractloris, which may switch his imaginative faculties ..tr some irrelevant task. Im- agination and concentration are be twin handmaids, who must his companions every yard of the of Way. If he divorces either them Els safety factor is siderably reduced.
There is a simple test of such points. I a motorist first drives a car over a given route, and then traverses it again as a pas- senger, he ought to be astounded at the many interesting details which he missed when at the wheel; for while he is at the wheel he should see little ex-· cept the actual road. its edges. and the traffic which it carries If he can make this test with- out being surprised by the un- guessed interest of the, journey on the second occasion, he is a bad and a dangerous driver.
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driver with the facility to per- form the correct actions with- out reflection the car must be driven much more slowly than an expert need drive. The time. wasted through agonised reflec-"
best course 20 tion about the adopt is even more serious than the
wasted through time naturally slow reaction period. That is why no good instructor ever lets a pupil drive alote until the pup can at least be trusted to act correctly on receiving a surprise
"Stop!" For order to the same reason this exercise is Wisely included in the official driving tests imposed before" the" issue of new licences. It a diffe- rence of three-fifths of a second in the inevitable reaction period can avert a collision altogether at a mere 40 mph. or produce: a smash at 28 mph. the poten- tial waste of two or three seconds. upon reflection may clearly pro- voke disasters of the first magni- tude
Opinioné differ whether or how far an individual can shorten his natural time lag Public spea kers develop amazingly in their knack, of repartee under heck ling; their development probably pivots on shortering the time required for reflection over the form of their answer rather than In any shortening of the periód which intervenes between reall sation that their control of the meeing is being challenged, and
SCHOOLMASTERING BROOKLANDS
(Special A'r Mail Service)
London June 14. There was a mild sensation at Brooklands when the wording, of the reprimand. on the popular Freddie Dixon was read out.
Last autumn Miss Fay Taylour was "carpeted" by the stewards for continuing round the track after the finish of a race. She was fined' £5 for her exuberance...
At the Easter meeting this year Dixon did exactly the same thing and was let off with warning Then he had another talking-to. this time of a character new to Brooklands.
Drivers have been suspended or disqualified before now. But for a motorist of international reputa- tion to be publicly censured in this way is unprecedented.
"
HONG KONG DAILY PRESS TUESDAY, JULY 2, 1935.
MOTOR JOTTINGS
AMERICAN CARS
Points Where Britain
Lags Behind
During the 1st month I have tried out on the road six different American cars, writes an English correspondent. All would rank in the United States as "cheap" cars, though their specifications differ radically from those of cheap European cars, and their British prices range from £225 to £350, or thereabouts, being swollen by ocean freights, tariffs, radiway. charges between the American factories and the coast, insurancé during transport, and the con- siderable overhead charges of the British importers,
These cars were all rated at over 20 h.p. by the British formula. All of them had excellent pressed and welded steel coachwork, of the
five-seated saloon paltern. - All of them consumed a gallon of petrol, or rather more, every All of them had twenty miles
of some three-speed gearboxes easy-change type. All of them would cruise at sixty miles an hour or more in a most attractive style, and would accelerate up to. eighty miles an hour or there- acouts op straight stretches of empty road.
In this country they would rank as much too large for the average middle-class driver, as their tax is beyond his means, and their fuel consumption is too high to ap- peal in a country where the price cf petrol oscillates round about 15. 6d per gallon. It is a little startling to realise that vehicles as the poor of this type rank man's car in the United States. where their cost, free on rail at the factory, averages about £120 for a full-size 20-h.p. five-seated saloon. This cost is increased by heavy railway or other delivery charges, if the buyer happens to reside at a great distance fram the factory. But their running costs in the United States are astonishingly low by comparison with home figures, seeing that petrol is cheap and taxation far lower than in these islands. Even if a British manufacturer could command such enormous outputs as the makers of some of these cars achieve, he could never dis- pose of them, for our population does not contain sufficent in- dividuals able to meet their run- ning bills. He can, therefore, never be criticised, because the United States offers its home buyers much more imposing and palatial value for their cheques. "Never- theless, the contrast between the typical British cheap car and Its American counterpart is sufi- ciently startling to disquiet observer, and it demands analysis.
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EXCELLENT FINISH
an some
In the Arst place. It used to be alleged that these cars do not, wear well. This may have been true once, but it is not true now. Then we are told that they are poorly finished Externally they are at least as smart as any Bri- tish car of the flow-production type. 11. we lift their bonnets or peer beneath their
flocrboards
we may perceive parts which in external finish are rougher than the products of any British ac- tory: but the internal finish is obviously excellent. Seeing how few cheap "twenties" we are able to sell in this country of high taxes and dear fuel it would be surprising it our engineers had brought this type of chassis to the high pitch attained in a land where it furnishes nearly every factory with its main sales.
I took over one of these cars last week, at a point eighty miles from London, and drive it fast and amoothly into the heart of London. without a single gear-change, ex cept when brought to an absolute Among the spectators was Lady Standstill in traffic, and on the Segrave, widow of Sir Henry Be-top gear was able to accelerate grave, greatest of British This was the first, time she had visited the track since she lost her husband.
drivers.
Dignity Guest: Are tips expected in
No, sah We is free:
the framing of an effective re- this restaurant?" tort. It may therefore be anala-Walter:
gous to the alarmed driver's bohn American citizens we is an we wish to preserve ouah self- period of reflection, which suc- ceeds the period in which he rea- "respect."W lisas that danger threatens him: We must draw a sharp distinc- tion between (a) the receipt of sensation and (b) reflection on
Guest: I'm glad to hear that Walter Yes, sah All we re- quires is a retainer fee, de same as de lawyers, sah
quite violently against all gradi ents after a traffic check; and this, although we had a "live" load of 80st. The ruining generally was delightful Even the brakes, once 1te weak point of cheap American cars, were perfectly admirable and well up to the highest stand dards; and the lands furnished ample driving light.
Moreover, the suspens.or these cars was incomparably more velvety than we normally expect or encounter on the averages Bri
In this respe the tish car United States ha Weck an advantage over our en- he motorcar
ROYAL TYRES
For Safe Driving
How many people realise that a large number of accidents are caused through faulty tyres? This is one point which I am afraid. many owner-drivers neglect for no matter what, make they may be using there comes a time when all the cords are worn out and this, coupled with the slippers road surface caused by the sum- mer rains, makes it imperative for more careful attention in this dir ection
The satery one needs in tyres depend on two things-the tread. and the carcass and from exper- lence I have found that Royal Lyres are proved to have the saf-" est tread design and in addition have great tread contact with the road!
It is also claimed that these tyres give 7% to 30% more safe miles than other makes, for it is denser, tougher, harder to pune- ture and more uniform in wear
Of course the main things the owner are interested in are mile- age and safety but the manufac- turerers of Royals state that their products give more than that. Ex- tremely good-look'ng in design,. they improve the appearance of even the smartest and most e- pensive car.
La
You can almost see at a glance
It's there in the greater depth of the extra mileage of a ROYAL tread. It's there in the tough, spe- Tempered compounded cially
the tread of which Rubber
be sure made. You can
because millions there it's of test miles proye that ROYALY give 7% to 36 & more mileage. In times such as these you wil wel- come the economy of the extra miles in ROYALS...the extra mile- age without extra cost.
began to boom in the United Sta- tes the roads between towns were mostly vile, and designers had to place smooth riding over båd ground very high on their list of Ideals. But since many of them adopted "kiee"action" or "inde- pendent front wheel" "springing, they have advanced from strength to strength, or perhaps I should rather say from velvet to thistle- down. I took all the cars under notice over a variety of really bad " surfaces and unmade roads, and without exception they rode mag- n'ficently. Carping critics w promptly ask whether they steer- ed accurately at speed, and cor- nered firmly in a hurry: and I can only reply that under all normal handling their suspension struck me as perfect.
the:
FRONT-WHEEL LAYOUT It may be that perfect suspen- sion demands a certain minlinum track and wheelbase, or even a certain minimum weight, and that the low-priced British car which
mties covers its thirty or forty per gallon and is taxed at some where between 7 hp, and 12 hp. Jacks the necessary dimensions and solidity. This may be so: but I formed the conclusion that British manufacturers of cheaper makes (not to include those with a more, liberal cost. margin) are hanging on far too stolidly to an inferior type of front-wheel layout. Patriot as I um. If I found myself residing overseas in any land where fuel was cheap and taxation of engines was low. I should fall in loyalty to my own country and buy any one of these big, masterful, com- fortable Americans in preference. not, only to the small cheap cars. of the homeland but also against the competition of our own chea per twenties" as well.^.
Living in England I cannot in- dulge this preference. I cannot spare the additional tax. I am too mean or too poor to buy two
will accomplish my journey in gallons of petrol where one, gallou practically the same time, 1 in reduced comfort, Some of these cars I would not buy even if tax
were low and fast cheap, for the simple reason that their impor tars are catchpenny people, cease to import when times are bad and bring over a few hundred chassis when times improve. Others are handled by more faith ful men, who permanently keep large stores of spares in this coun try and provide good service facilities
Altogether I have a horrid su spicion that we could learn more from the American
Industry than we are ready to
NEW IDEAS IN NEW MORRIS
Inbuilt Hydraulic Jacks
A speedometer with a special that 30 Indicate marking to mp.h. has been reached is the contribution of Morris Motors to- wards the solution of the motor- ist's biggest problem to-day.
It is one of the feature of two -new Morris cars--a ten-four and a twelve-four-detalls of which have been made known recently. For, the practical motorist, per- haps the most attractive point about these models is that they are fitted with an ebuilt hydrau- operated le jacking system, from inside the car, which, with out effort, Truises all four wheels or the two front or the two back Wheel- wheels, off the ground. changing is thus made almost a joy!
STREAM-LINED A sloping radiator and wind- screen, a curved roofline, and
rear of the the gentle sweep
spare which the panelling, in wheel is atted Bush, give the cars. a mildly stream-lined ap- pearance and minimum air re- sistance.
All four, passengers sit within the wheel-base, and for each there is ample head room, while A steering wheel insulated from road shocks increases the com- fort of driving
An outside luggage is available If required, but there is generous accommodation provided for bag- gage in a built-in compartment bebind the rear seat. the cus- hlons of which are hinged. Direction Indicators are cealed in the body pillars. and a coloured warning light in the wheel centre of the steering shows when they are in use.
SYNCROMESH GEARS
con-
In the four-cylinder engines air- has been incorporated an cleaner, which consumes fumes and prevents their entering the car.
WEEK-END OF DISASTERS
In Britain And Europe
London/June 30, This has been a week-end not- able for disasters.
AUTOMOBILE RACE
Hans Stück Scores
1Special to the "douz Kong Bril
Prese” ((Zupyright).)
Kochel, June 30, In addition to the Italian naval,
The Orst great mountain auto- collision and the Japanese' floods, the latter taking 72 Uves, a mobile race of the present year, terrible motor accident occurred at indeed the oldest mountain. auto- Capa Blanca. Thirteen are be race in the world, was run here leved to have been burned alive for the first time since 1905.
The tenth international Kessel In the wreckage of a motor bus
race" took place on which overturned and caught fire. mountain
Eight others were seriously in- Sunday amid sublimely beautiful Jured in a crash caused when the Bavarian Alpine scenery looking- driver swerved suddenly to avoid its best in clear sunlight, on" the Ideal racing track between Kochel
B COW.
Casale Monferrato.
were
who were
From Turin, it is learned that and Walchensee,
Al the Bavarians killed, Ave of them seven were boys, and 120 boys were injured interested in motor racing turned that all the slopes along when a motor coach and trailer ut so
being thickly covered with enthusiasts, many in crashed over a thirty-foot cliff at the route
costumes. native
clinging
Hike impets to the steep mountain sides to catch a bare glimpse of groups of the competitors' dash- Expectations were again fully ing by at breakneck speed. satisfied and interest was centred on Hans Stuck who put up last. year's record of three minutes 44
the five kilometres seconds for mountain track averaging 80.40 kilometres
whose per hour and victory on Sunday was universally considered certain.
At Bemay, France, after running over the butters, a goods train toppled into the river Charren- tonne. The engine driver and fire- man swam ashore, uninjured, and no-one else was hurt, but much valuable merchandise was lost.- Beater.
SILENCING THE ROAD DRILL
in recent years thousands of pounds have been spent by the' manufacturers of pneumatic road-breaking equipment in at- tempting to perfect a method of silencing these tools without loss of working power. Up to new suc- cess in this direction has been strictly limited, for the technical dificulties to be overcome are more formidable than most peo- ple realise. A far-travelled Scot- tish engineer said that his co- workers in ant-noise research distinguish three distinct noises made by the so-alled road drills at work the ring of steel on steel, the hammering of steel on concrete, and the sound of the ex- haust. For practical purposes the first two offer a noise problem which appears almost insoluble, and experts are now concentrat ing on the exhaust. But in effect- ing a 40 per cent. silencing here, they find there is a 38 per cent loss in the working efficiency of the machine.
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The chief competitor was the Spanlard Zanelli, on a Nazional Pescara Atted with a completely hew motor: Stuck however car- ried off the honours driving an too Autounion which this time proved to be the best of all vehicles competing. He covered the
44.3 distance in 3 minutes seconds,
average that is at an speed 80.14 kilometres per hout.
nt
The Autounlon was second and Toni Bauhofer was third on DKW in three minutes 47 seconds: at an average speed of 79.2 kiln- metres per hour.
Arthur Geis, on another DKW or 250 cub, em established a new record for all, classes in 3 minutes 49.4 seconds at an average speed of 79.3 Besides these there were numerous "other records establish- ed in one of the most memorable days in the history of auto- racing-
Traninseng Kan Man
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