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).
The design of a new 4-speed gearbox, detailing its semi-silent, easy-change features.
| Identifier | WestWitteringFiles\V\October1930-February1931\ Scan056 | |
| Date | 13th November 1930 guessed | |
| (3) the design work this month. In the meantime Derby have many parts that they can proceed with. We finally came to the conclusion that to overcome certain difficulties of control and operation a 3 speed box was advisable instead of the 2 speed, which was all that the schemes call for to give 4 speeds. In this box, which is naturally a completely new design we have made the 2nd. a semi-silent easy change by dog clutch and single helical gears, so that we are now hoping to quickly have a more silent and very easy change 3rd. and top (generally called double top), and also a more silent and fairly easy 2nd., which should be very nice to get away with from a standing start, and low enough for even the steepest hills, and for ordinary traffic we only need the easy change lower top or 3rd. gear. The latter is obtained by pre-selection from the steering column and closing the throttle - i.e. neither clutch or side lever need be touched. Naturally we hope that we shall not be disappointed. At least narrow patents covering the work we are doing should be obtained. DA.{Bernard Day - Chassis Design} and BY.{R.W. Bailey - Chief Engineer} will look into this for all the schemes because there are many novel ideas and details which are the result of much hard thinking. R.{Sir Henry Royce} | ||