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).
Tractor manufacturers, fuel consumption, and ignition system improvements.
| Identifier | ExFiles\Box 178\2\ img024 | |
| Date | 13th April 1940 guessed | |
| -3- Serial No.78 from Olley. Tractors. International Harvester is the leader in farm tractors. Allis Chalmers is the runner-up in technical development. Is now entering the tractor field, both for agricultural and construction work. Uses G.M. diesel engines on the larger tractors. John Deere is the runner-up on International in quantity of tractors built. Wilson was unable to criticize their design as compared with the other two. Caterpillar make only large tractors for construction work and are not in the agricultural field. Fuel consumption. Wilson has been making a study of fuel consumption against car speed at full throttle and under level load cruising conditions. The Ford Mercury is the outstanding car. This has a cylinder design and compression ratio which will produce detonation when run full throttle on lean mixtures. It avoids trouble by running very lean under cruising conditions. Wilson is developing this study further with the idea of proving how to improve economies on G.M. cars. Ignition. He thinks I shall get more information on ignition troubles from Sam Heron, A.C., Champion, than from Delco Remy. He says the outstanding improvements in power and economy are to be obtained by the use of double breakers and double coils on 8 cylinder engines or else by one of the experimental systems of vacuum tube amplification on the primary current. He agrees in general that the ability to fire lean mixtures depends on the excess voltage available from the coil. Spark gaps up to 1/16 of an inch are now being used experimentally. Olley. | ||