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).
Improving gear-changing mechanisms, comparing selector gears, epicyclic gears, and sliding gears.
| Identifier | ExFiles\Box 75\5\ scan0009 | |
| Date | 1st March 1919 | |
| Contd. -2- EH3/LG4.3.19. ------------ If one could be certain of the gear-box shafts running at the correct relative speeds for changing gear, there would be no need for the inconvenient cumbersome change speed lever as we know it. One can imagine that with a proper selector gear the change speed lever need not be any larger than the mixture lever we use on the steering column. The actual operation of changing gear could be carried out either by the clutch pedal or the gears could be slid in and out by oil pressure. I realise that there are plenty of difficulties in the way of getting the scheme to work reliably but it may work out that this could be developed easier than the epicyclic gear for the cars. In any case we feel certain it is only a matter of time before the very crude method of crashing gears which is at present used on the majority of motor cars, is obsolete. Nobody objects to the sliding type of gear except for the difficulty of changing speed, so the choice lies between epic- cyclic change speed gear box or to make changing gear on the present box fool-proof. EH. | ||