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).
Experiments to resolve low-speed steering wobble issues on the Goshawk 11 model.
| Identifier | WestWitteringFiles\I\July1922\ Scan115 | |
| Date | 26th July 1922 | |
| To R.{Sir Henry Royce} from Hs.{Lord Ernest Hives - Chair} c. to CJ. c. to E.{Mr Elliott - Chief Engineer} c. to Da.{Bernard Day - Chassis Design} c. to BY.{R.W. Bailey - Chief Engineer} ORIGINAL. Hs{Lord Ernest Hives - Chair}6/LG26.7.22. GOSHAWK 11. - STEERING. X4264 We have carried out a number of experiments lately in connection with this. We have fitted up a car with a plain thrust but we are in trouble with violent low speed steering wobbles. The wobbles come on between 10 and 15 m.p.h. We tried the car with the friction taken out of the pivots and using the friction in the column only - it was impossible to run because of steering wobbles. With the friction in the pivots we still get wobbles if we strike the right road. We have been rather at a loss to understand why the car which went to Le CanadelHenry Royce's French residence with the plain thrust did not show up the same fault - we are carrying out experiments on the identical car. We have checked over such things as lean of pivots et. and we have confirmed previous results i.e., the more backward lean the worse the wobble. The wobbles were also worse with flexible springs in the side steering tube but they were not cured even if we had no springs at all in the side steering tube. There has been one or two instances when we have had a slight steering wobble apparent on a standard Goshawk 11. car. We have another car running which has the standard steering on which we have increased the friction on the pivots temporary by fitting Ferodo (in place of fibre) without lubrication. We have found that this is definitely better than the present standard Hs.{Lord Ernest Hives - Chair} | ||