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).
Letter from A. Duckham discussing Bentley engine performance and lubrication with ADCOIDS oil additive.
| Identifier | ExFiles\Box 146\1\ scan0333 | |
| Date | 25th July 1938 | |
| COPY. AD/EH. Duckham House, 16, Cannon Street E.C. 4. W. SLEATOR Esq., Franco-Britannic Autos Ltd., 25, rue Gide, LEVALLOIS-PERRET. 25th July, 1938. Dear Sir, I am greatly obliged to you for the trouble you have taken in your letter of 22nd July. Let me say to begin with that I am having no trouble whatsoever with the engine of my Bentley. One of its duties is to be driven by me practically every day from my Farm to the suburbs and I generally reckon that the 26 miles take 30 minutes, except in wet weather. I have several stretches of really good speed arterial road which are comparatively clear at the time I use them. I am so fond of the car that I will not drive her in traffic as the crowd is so apt to charge into one. I am confident that the car runs noticeably better on ADCOIDS than without and is also quieter, which I attribute to the fact that the ADCOID material lubricates the valves. I am interested to learn from you that such trouble as occurs is, however, in the crank chamber and I am absolutely sure that to combat the conditions which you mention one wants something other than mere viscosity. You want lubrication which is quite a different thing, and giving honour where honour is due, Messrs. Price were the first people, I believe, to recognise the shortcomings of the pure mineral oil. Most of the technical staff and works that I visit seem at the moment to be suffering from a peculiar thin oil craze. Admittedly, you want a reasonable viscosity curve. I think what we will next do will be to super-ADCOIDISE this mineral oil, disregarding the effect on viscosity at ordinary temperatures, as we can always deal with the latter. If we get hopeful results I shall be bothering you to help us in testing. Next time you are over here I should so much like to have a chat with you at our Research Laboratory and then we could go into all the many repercussions of the use of ADCOID material. They go so much beyond the mere question of minimising corrosion, which was the original target. Again thanking you, Yours faithfully, Sgd. A.{Mr Adams} DUCKHAM | ||