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).
Experiments to increase the power of the starting mechanism's actuator box for a parallel arrangement.
| Identifier | WestWitteringFiles\D\December1919\ Scan31 | |
| Date | 23th December 1919 | |
| To R.{Sir Henry Royce} from Ck.{Mr Clark} c. to CJ. c. to E, c. to Bn.{W.O. Bentley / Mr Barrington} c. to Da.{Bernard Day - Chassis Design} c. to EP.{G. Eric Platford - Chief Quality Engineer} c. to By.{R.W. Bailey - Chief Engineer} c. to Hs.{Lord Ernest Hives - Chair} ORIGINAL X.3748 - ACTUATOR BOX OF INCREASED POWER FOR PARALLEL ARRANGEMENT. Owing to a few failures which have been experienced in the electrical operation of the starting mechanism, as reported to you in Bn{W.O. Bentley / Mr Barrington}11/W19.12.19, we have an actuator box experimentally wound with a gauge of wire two sizes larger than standard in order to increase the ampere turns available on this box. Although we have not had an actuator box with this winding in operation on a car, there is not the slightest doubt of the increased efficiency of this arrangement, as we have made a thorough set of comparative experiments on the bench between the combination of this box with the standard main switch, and the combination of standard actuator box and main switch. We set up for instance, two actuator boxes side by side on the bench, each loaded up to the same amount representative as nearly as possible of the actual load met with on the car, and further the load was suspended in each case in a bath of oil so as to imitate a viscous resistance. It was patently obvious from these experiments that the magnetic circuit of the standard actuator box is not made full use of. With the standard combination for instance, there was quite a definite time lag of about one-third of a second Contd. | ||