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 performance and mechanical issues of a 'Propaganda Car' after a 10,000-mile tour.
| Identifier | ExFiles\Box 18\3\ Scan112 | |
| Date | 25th June 1930 | |
| TO. WHR.{Mr Wheeler} FROM EV.{Ivan Evernden - coachwork} COPY TO PN.{Mr Northey} C. HS.{Lord Ernest Hives - Chair} E.{Mr Elliott - Chief Engineer} DA.{Bernard Day - Chassis Design} X7960 RV25/6/30. RE PROPAGANDA CAR 12.XU. SPRINGING. I saw the above car in company with PN.{Mr Northey} and the driver. I understand that the car has covered about 10,000 miles in Egypt, Algeria, Greece, Czecho-Slovakia, Poland, Germany and France. It would appear that the car functioned perfectly satisfactorily in France, Egypt and Algeria; and all the troubles occurred after Athens. It seems to have been demonstrated that it is unreasonable to hope for a perfect performance under the widely diversified road conditions with any one suspension which would give a 100% riding under the following conditions. (a) Town carriage work, in cities. (b) High speeds on French roads. (c) Slow speeds on bad roads in and around towns such as were encountered in Greece. (d) Speeds up to 60 m.p.h. over roads with large gullies and pot holes, covered with loose mud sand or stones. To deal with such conditions as experienced in Greece it would seem necessary to split the tour into two parts, and that the car should be specially prepared for conditions (c) and (d). We understand that the high pressure damper springs were changed at Athens. SUBFRAME REAR BRACKET. This bracket on the frame broke, the cause being the torsional deflexion of the rear end of the frame. When this happened the relative movement between the scuttle and dash was increased shewing that in spite of the semi-flexible subframe suspension the coachwork does add rigidity to the chassis frame. The bracket was repaired immediately. REAR AXLE. The covers of the rear brake drums were tornoff by two bolt heads in the wheel arch which encroached on the normal clearances. The slight touching of the cover on the top of the arch would not have been serious, but we do think that whilst we normally wish to keep our clearances as fine as possible to get the clearances on a car such as this propaganda car, in view of the road conditions. The hub ball bearing which gave trouble appears to have got a piece of foreign matter on one of the races. This failure would appear to have no peculiar relation to the tour. It is reported that the hubs of the brake levers on the rear axle were distorted by flying stones, causing the levers to bind and the brakes to be held on. WE DO NOT SEE THE MECHANICAL EXPLANATION OF THIS. | ||