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 the Springfield, Mass. office concerning customer complaints about winter starting troubles and the development of a choker device.
| Identifier | ExFiles\Box 50\3\ Scan074 | |
| Date | 4th May 1921 | |
| X4305 Springfield, Mass. May 4th, 1921 Mr. Claude Johnson 15 Conduit Street, London, England. X3667 X4305 Dear Mr. Johnson, Re Cylinder Wear - Winter Starting troubles. Under date of April 8th. Mr. Olley wrote you in the usual way (OY7/G28.4.21) for the attention of Mr. Hives under the subject of "Winter Starting troubles". Too much stress cannot be laid upon the last page of this letter, copy of which is attached. Last Winter we had in the hands of customers only about thirty postwar cars, and as you know, the complaints from these customers were most serious. The complaints were largely difficulty in starting in winter weather. This winter we will have on the road in the hands of customer about 200 chassis, and unless something is done at once to improve winter starting and running conditions our ratio of troubles are going to be ten to one, and I look upon this matter with the greatest concern. We realise that it is very difficult to develop quickly some kind of choking device and better starting conditions in general, but nevertheless, if we do not produce something at once, which is going to eliminate this trouble we are building up a large clientele of dissatisfied customers. The owner of a Rolls-Royce car in the United States expects that his car will start and run at least as satisfactorily as the cheapest cars built in the United States. As stated in the attached letter, we are developing and experimenting with a choker device. In the meantime we are turning out cars without it, as we are also importing other cars from England without, and I am not pessimistic in saying that when the winter weather comes, we are going to have a complaint from practically all the cars produced here as well as those we have imported. I know that you are doing your best to develop something quickly to eliminate the difficulty and we are doing our best. We have not found anything up to the present time that we can apply which is by any means satisfactory although it is believed by our engineers that the starting and running conditions will be greatly improved by the application of a choker and heated induction pipe. Yours very truly, Sgd. L.J. Belnap. | ||