Inhibitions
Motoring
THE design and building of motor-cars is an industry that probably suffers from more inhibitions than 'any. other. I am not at all sure that inhibition is the right word or even the word that -is current pseudo-sckntifie jargon, but I mean it to mean pig-headedness. Possibly the companion word complex is the more correct, but of the ultimate sense there is little doubt. It is a fixed idea out of which the sufferer will not be smacked.
It's like this. American makers, with very few exceptions, suffer from the delusions that a four-speed gear-box is a confession of engine-failure, that in order to give wide and comfortable outlook the windows and screen of a saloon must be as small as is acceptable.' I have no doubt that every American bodymaker drives and is driven in the cars of his own design, cursing them heartily. Does he go home and produce a different pattern ? He does not, any more than his colleague in the chassis department dreams of giving the next 100,000 units a hand-brake that will stop the car on a gradient or a screen-wiper that is not at least 15 years behind the times—a suction-worked antique that only does its job at low engine-speeds.
It cannot be a question of money. When you turn out a quarter of a million cars a year, with a handsome profit for the shareholders, the margin of shop-expenses cannot be so narrow as to forbid the fitting of a' wiper that is found on the cheapest British cars or the re-designing of a brake-gear that relies mainly for its efficiency upon the angle and length of toggle arms.
Neither of these things, among others, affects, except in the most superficial manner, the remarkable value and general excellence of the average American car. You are not really' perturbed because you have only three speeds in a car of between 26 and 40 horsepower- weighing 30 cwt. or less. The temperamental screen-wiper is certainly a nuisance, but when you have fitted an English one that works properly you forget all about it. And the foot-brake is usually so good that you forgive the other. It is only when you have sold the car and got another with a four-speed box, an efficient wiper, and a brake that will stop and hold the car in more difficult conditions than those of a level car-park, that you realise the inner meaning of a car-inhibition or complex. It is utterly without reason.
The main British inhibition is, of course, weight. Our designers give us better value than any others in everything that pleases and comforts. Size for size our cars are more
efficient than any except possibly one or two special Italians and Germans. They get quieter and smoother every year,
their equipment is in the true sense of the word complete-- everything you must have and practically everything you like—their performance is remarkable ; but they are too heavy—the complex or inhibition, as difficult to understand as the American dread of proper side-brakes and practical screen-wipers. It cannot be that our engineers do not know that the less the deadweight the more economic the whole working of the car, from sheer pace upwards, yet the stories one hears from the works" make one wonder whether there is not some fatal quality about a blue print or a mechanical drawing or even in the air of the places themselves. Here is one I recently enjoyed from an official eye-witness. ;` Bit light there, eh, Bill ? What d'you think about it ? " And Bill, knowing that " there " is about twice as heavy as it need be, replied with that all-convincing head-scratch " P'raps you're right, George. Better be on the safe side. Stiffen her up a bit more." And the 1937 car went out to compete with its deadliest rivals carrying a voluntary handicap that can never be compensated.
If their faithfully reported conversation never took place, if neither Bill nor George are true, the results of their deliberaticn3.are plain to see.
This complex of ours is all the more inexplicable and depressing because our cars, with that senseless handicap, do put up such gallant performances. In the course of my own work I regularly drive cars on test up a series of hills, varying in steepness from the gentle slope up which one flies to the fierce gradient that brings one down with con-
siderable firmness to first or second gear and, for most cars, a speed well below the built-up area limit. Times are taken
on each attempt and on the last, for my own satisfaction as well as for a basis of comparison, the results are recorded, together with the gear-ratios on which the hill is climbed and the weight of the cars. British cars in the under 15-h.p. class come brilliantly out of this rivalry. -With no more than half a dozen exceptions they have beaten the world, and beaten it handsomely. '
I have several instances in my records, but the most outstanding is the time made, by a 11-1itre British car,
weighing 26 cwt., which beat a foreign 2-litre 17 cwt. car by three seconds. The British car, though described by that iepulsive word sports in its catalogue, was a perfectly normal touring carriage, while the foreign car was, for size, well down in the 10-h.p. class. On another occasion a 10-h.p. 1,185 c.c. British car', weighing 19 cwt. climbed that hill in five seconds less than a distinguished foreigner of the same size, but weighing three cwt. less. Naturally there is more to say about it than that. Both the foreign cars were lighter to drive and, control, both had swifter acceleration, both needed less fuel and, because of their light weight, were probably easier on their tyres. One of the British cars had by far the best brakes of the four and both were superior in comfort and finish. The current rate of exchange made it difficult to be perfectly fair about prices, the foreigners costing a good deal more in this country, but at par or at home there was little to choose between them.
These cars, as well as others in my book, were well-known examples of popular models in their respective countries. There was nothing " special " about them. What, then, would be the showing of the British machines if they had been built proportionately as light as their very serious rivals ? The latter would not have had a look-in. The supreme advantage of lightness does not, of course, lie in the fact that you can climb a steep hill faster than the next car, but that the whole process of driving is less tiring, that you have better control over the car, that, provided it is well built, it will last longer and cost less to run and keep in repair.' Why ciin Italian, German and American be successfully built lighter than our own by anything from [Note.—Readers' requests for advice from our Motoring Correspondent on the choice of new cars should be accompanied by a stomped and addressed envelope. The highest price payable must be given;- as well as the type of body required. No advice can be given on the purchase, sale or exchange of used cars.]
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