Fon the first time for many years I have had
a letter from a reader, dated days after the opening of the Show; asking me for advice on the choice of a car. He says, in effect if not in so many words, " How can any man or woman make up a mind, already unbalanced by the Show atmosphere, when confronted by about thirty different makes, about thirty different horsepowers, and nobody has counted how many different prices ? "
His complaint, although it is the first I have seen on paper while the Show is actually on, is common enough. To anyone who does not know in advance .which, of, say,. two or three makes or types he really needs, who has not .already found out something about them at least a month beforehand from his local dealer, the papers, the makers' catalogues or from the talk of friends and acquaintances, the Show is no place for so momentous a decision. If it does not matter how large a cheque you draw, and if you. can buy the actual, identical car that takes your fancy ,on the stand, , Olympia is a pleasant enough sort of shop; where the goods are well displayed and the choice satisfactorily wide. Failing these two conditions the fate of the average buying visitor is exhaustion, followed inevitably by depression.
• There are still two days left in which to decide, if not which particular car will suit you better than any of the others, at any rate which features and characteristics are necessary to your contentment. If you are still wavering because these essentials are inconveniently distributed among a dozen makes and their six dozen models, now is thernoment to take a grip of yourself, a firm line and a sheet of paper on which you arc to write down those things your new car must have.
Obviously the things considered necessary by a few thousand intending buyers of every kind of car from the £100 Ford to the 12-cylindered Bolls-Royce, Cadillac or Hispano-Suiza, cannot be written down in a single page of The Spectator, nor, in all probability, in a whole number, but there are certain definite indispensabilities common to every sort of ear, no matter what it costs. Actually, of course, the case of those who, blank cheque in hand, are
beSitating whether to choose the Rolls-Royce, the Cadillac, the Hispano-Suiza or any of their runners-up in price, size nnd. 'comfort, need not be considered. They ought to enjoy their troubles. Our concern is rather with the majority who have to set a limit and a narrow one on the cheques they write.
Here, then, are some of the things that are quite certainly indispensable in 1936. You must have plenty of room. This will be much easier to ensure in the new cars than it has ever been before, but it is still possible to buy too small a car, at the wrong price. Plenty of room is an essential to comfort, and comfort is an essential not only to safety because you cannot be in perfect control if your attention is in the slightest degree distracted by lack of ease, but to economy. You will tire far more quickly of an uncomfortable car than of one that does not altogether please you in other ways. If it is rather less lively than you had hoped, rather noisier, a bit harder on the road, you will be quite willing to be patient with it, to give tit a. chance. It roay, improve' in perfornrianee, the noise may be curable, the springing amenable to treatment. So long as you sit in it and drive it without discomfort or fatigue you will be slow to condemn it. You will not be able to rid yourself of it soon enough if it is uncomfortable—and if lack of money prevents this swift divorce you will hate it more every day you live with it. Buy the biggest body you can get for your money. Sonic of the new ones seat, three in front. Examine these carefully and consider seriously whether this immense advant- age will not counteract other drawbacks.
See to it that you have generous head-room, dismissing at once all cars that are of low inside build. They are dangerous as well as horribly uncomfortable. Verify the leg-room both fOre and aft, when the front seats are set well forward and well back. Remember that there is no agony comparable with sitting for several hours with your knees drawn up. And be on the look-out for shallow seats. No ear-seat, front or hack, is endurable for long distances unless it conies near enough to the inside of one's knees. Luggage-room you are fairly certain to get in the 1936 cars, but it is well to snake sure that a reasonable amount can be carried for the usual number of people you take touring, and that none of it occupies passenger-space. Nearly all closed ears are properly ventilated nowadays, but not all have wide vision. See that the front, pillars do not umif y obstruct the driver's view.
Everything else being equal choose your ear for its simplicity of design, general accessibility and ease of maintenance. Prefer an engine that it is easy to decarbonise to one in which the operation entails much dismantling of components. Valve adjustment is often a much easier job with an overhead push-rod system, but head-lifting is not always so simple as with the side-valved lay-out. Look to the brake-adjustments and allot high marks to cars that have central control by which you can tighten the brakes equally and without having to jack up. Consider no engine in which the main oil-filter is not easily and quickly removable, without having to get under- neath, for cleaning purposes. The battery, that family invalid, must be easily accessible. You need not worry over transmission systems, over those gear-changes which led to such bitter conflict a few years ago. Whether the car of your choice has a synchro-meshed gear (and there are no " straight " boxes left, so far as I know) with or without a free-wheel, or a pre-selective gear, you will find it difficult to change clumsily. With some " post-selective " boxes, synehro-meshed or free- wheeled, you cannot always change very quickly unless you double de-clutch, but you cannot, if you have a second's patience, make a mess of it. And buy enough power. It is easy enough today, when nearly every car of over 10 h.p. is advertised to do 60 miles an hour, but still make very sure of a good reserve. You need not worry any more over the number of cylinders (except from the point of view of simplicity) but get the largest you can afford, and, if you are given the choice, those with a low rather than a high compression-ratio. The pleasantest car to own: the one you will keep longest and have least trouble with is the lazy-engined car, a sort of modern edition of what we used to call soft or woolly cars. They may, comparatively speaking, be soft nowadays, but they are certainly not woolly. They get their power from size rather than from high efficiency and speed, and the result is usually very agreeable. A big- , bored engine, developing its cruising speed at 2,000 revolutions may be a little more extravagant on fuel than the smaller engine that is as lively or a little livelier, but the difference over long runs is seldom worth troubling over if it is a-question of pence, never if comfort counts high.
The sensible car today is the big and simple one. It is also likely to turn out the cheapest in the long run.
Jonx PRIOLEAU.
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