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).
Issues with steering, braking, and carburation during a vehicle trial.
| Identifier | ExFiles\Box 180\M2\M2.6\ img043 | |
| Date | 22th September 1925 guessed | |
| -4- stood that the standard adjustment is between parallel and one-eight of an inch toed in. (b) The steering takes charge if the brakes are applied with the wheels locked over. This does not always happen. It appears to occur more frequently if the brakes have to be applied suddenly. On one occasion, a woman stepped off the pavement straight in front of the car, and I swerved out and applied the brakes simultaneously - the wheel was nearly torn out of my hand. I was subsequently able to reproduce it, but, in the ordinary way, it is quite safe to gradually apply the brake on a wide turn and no particular pull is felt on the steering wheel. (c) Throughout the run, there has been a slight tendency for the car to pull to the left when the brakes are applied. (d) The shocks transmitted to the steering wheel due to passing over inequalities of the road, are considered to be much too severe. Considerable strength is required to hold the steering wheel over anything but a good road. One's normal method of holding the wheel has to be changed and the wheel must be held absolutely firmly, otherwise, the car will become absolutely out of control owing to the violent oscillations of the steering wheel. (and) Improvement, both as regards the amplitude of the movement caused and the severity of shocks as felt at the steering wheel is urgently required. There was no sign at any time of a steering wobble. The wheels were balanced and front tyre pressures kept at 45 lbs per sq. inch. (3) CARBURATION. (a) This car possesses a most annoying high pitched whistle from the throttle from 34 m.p.h. to 38 m.p.h. (b) Throughout the trial, the petrol consumption was only fair, and the carburation was very irregular indeed, and satisfactory slow running almost impossible to obtain. | ||