Translated letter from A. Schmidt providing a road test review and critique of Chassis 26-MX.
| Identifier | ExFiles\Box 19\1\ Scan083 | |
| Date | 11th December 1930 | |
| Copy. TRANSLATION OF LETTER FROM SCHMIDT, dated 11th December 1930. RR/1938/CR {Mr Cra’ster / Mr Chichester} --------------------------------------------------------------------- Dear Sirs, Re Chassis 26-MX. {John H Maddocks - Chief Proving Officer} I am in receipt of your favour of the 3rd inst. Whr {Mr Wheeler} /MaclE/D, and wish to inform you that in Switzerland we have no roads in which to make very complete trials of the car for maximum speed, but in any case, between Nyon and Rolls, on a stretch of 3 kms of straight road, I noticed that the speedometer touched 90 miles. What also interested me was, on passing the Hauenstein pass (near Bale) which is not very difficult, but with many curves, I climbed and took curves at a speed of 90 and 100 me kilometers per hour, without the car giving any impression of swaying, but giving on the contrary a feeling of great security. If my account can be of any use to you, I have never skidded, and the braking, used moderately, gave fully what is expected from the best braking in the world. As a critic, I would have liked to see the firm of Rolls-Royce use something other than the Hartford for double shock absorbers, because I fear that the dry and hard resistance which naturally gives perfect holding of the road incurs the risk of affecting fairly quickly the coachwork, and will surely produce in the long run, a great deal of noise, as much to the coachwork as to the Hartford Shock absorbers, the axes of which are not greased. I feel sure that the engineers of the technical department will soon find a shock absorber worthy of being coupled to the Rolls-Royce hydraulic shock-absorber. For the rest, I am absolutely of the opinion that the speed of the car should be maintained in the case of duplicate cales, and remaining at your disposal for any further information you may need, I beg to remain, Yours faithfully. A. {Mr Adams} SCHMIDT. | ||
From the Rolls-Royce experimental archive: a quarter of a million communications from Rolls-Royce, 1906 to 1960's. Documents from the Sir Henry Royce Memorial Foundation (SHRMF).