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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).
Strip condition of a flexible drive and the functional testing of its associated electrical equipment.

Identifier  ExFiles\Box 178\4\  img082
Date  1st May 1932 guessed
  
-3-

Hs{Lord Ernest Hives - Chair}/Yng.l/ADSL.S.32 contd.

of a core of several strands of wire bound with two layers of wire which are superimposed and wound in opposite directions.

Photograph (c) shows the driven end of the flexible drive and illustrates that under torque, the outer layer of wire tends to unwind since the dynamo rotates in a clockwise direction when viewed from the driving end. This may have been the cause of the failure and in any case was an error, as the design specified a drive cable in which the outer coil was wound in such a direction as to tighten under the driving torque.

(c) Strip condition of the drive.

The drive was inspected after the 2 hours acceptance test and again at the end of the running.

On both occasions everything was found to be in excellent condition, the gear teeth were all polished and free from scoring and picking up and the serrations which lock the adaptor in the inner race of the bearing on the final drive to the spindle were free from fretting and oxidisation. The supercharger gearing was in perfect order and the intermediate gear which drives the dynamo gear train could not be distinguished from the rest.

(d) Functioning of the electrical equipment.

The R.A.E. Mark IV generator functioned satisfactorily throughout the whole run and when it was examined afterwards was found to be in good condition except that the set of brushes at the end of the dynamo remote from the armature windings had scored the commutator somewhat. The commutator was cleaned up and the dynamo is now good for further tests.

Trouble was experienced with the R.A.E. regulator. After 4½ hours of the 2nd ten hours had been run, the dynamo output increased to 100 amps. In order to keep going, a variable resistance was put in the dynamo field circuit in series with the regulator to reduce the dynamo output to its normal figure - viz. 70 amperes. During the running at the increased output no drop in dynamo speed occurred.

Before the acceptance test was commenced, tests were carried out on the R.A.E. cutout. With the arrangement of wiring as shown in the sketch, the cutout came into operation at 1223 engine R.P.M. With the resistance unit out and the battery only in the cutout circuit i.e. the dynamo
  
  


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