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).
Five observations and difficulties regarding a proposed modification to the Peregrine II steering column.
| Identifier | ExFiles\Box 179b\1\ img191 | |
| Date | 29th February 1932 | |
| TO HS.{Lord Ernest Hives - Chair} FROM EV.{Ivan Evernden - coachwork} COPY TO Z. ORIGINAL X4077. PEREGRINE II. STEERING. In connection with your conversation on the telephone yesterday in which you asked that the steering column box be moved back 2.000ins. in order to clear the carburetter, we have looked into the matter and would like to make the following observations. (1) The end of the side steering tube is just clear of the dashboard stiffener and side wheel carrier foot at present. It would be necessary to persuade Sales to agree to carry one spare wheel on the near-side only instead of the off-side and to move out the ball end of the pendulum lever to pass over the stiffener with the consequent loss of lock. We do not for one moment think that Sales would agree to the spare wheel being on the near-side. (2) The "P" Type column in its lowest adjustment would come so low on the back of the dash as to be off the bottom edge and would cut into the top of the sloping footboard. This would make the adjustable column impossible due to the difficulty of making a gastight joint around the column at this point when the latter cuts into the sloping board. We had this trouble on the Pere. II. originally and "BY" can shew you a layout illustrating the difficulty. (3) Sg.{Arthur F. Sidgreaves - MD} mentioned to me the other day the Fiat Type Steering with a gearbox on the dash giving a very horizontal column angle, largely because our angles of column are too steep for modern owner driver and sporting requirements. (4) The steering column tube will come lower onto the foot of the driver and will force the brake pedal foot more on to the accelerator pedal plate, the clearance of which is already only just enough. We would like to move the tube up out of the way of the foot so that the brake pedal could be moved in. We cannot widen the scuttle without spoiling the body lines. (5) We do not like the driving position when the column is between the driver's knees as its spoils the accessibility of the seat for ingress and egress. We see no real solution to overcome Item one. The other difficulties could be overcome by moving the box back and lifting it at the same time. This would give a pendulum lever length of 9.250ins. To maintain the same number of turns of the steering wheel as now the rocker arm would have to be increased to 1.475ins. which would mean a new steering box. We do not think we should like to keep the present length of rocker arm and reduce the lead of the worm from .700ins. to .510ins. EV.{Ivan Evernden - coachwork} | ||