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).
Technical report on issues with the clutch, gearbox, and carburettor for the 32-EX model.
| Identifier | ExFiles\Box 101\1\ scan0284 | |
| Date | 5th June 1936 | |
| -2- 32-EX. (1) Clutch. We have got to change the clutch plate on 32-EX because an exactly similar plate has failed on a demonstration run on 34-EX. The new plate we are sending out will differ from the old one only in that the fabric will be more firmly attached to it. When we fit this plate we want to be sure that the lugs which guide the pressure plate are perfectly free so that there is no chance of anything tightening up when the clutch is hot. Furthermore, the splines should be perfectly free and the clearance the same on all operating fingers. At the present moment this clutch is not entirely free from jaggers. Any information which can be obtained to indicate why the Ph.III is worse than the Bentley or 20/25 will be of value. Incidentally, the flywheel and pressure plate contact surfaces should be polished if there are any machine marks on them, before the new clutch is fitted. (2) Gearbox. Production are having no trouble with the gearboxes made to the same drawings as the one fitted to 32-EX. We should therefore dismantle this gearbox to find out what has gone wrong with it. We shall follow up with another gearbox having 9° cones, screw-threaded and corrected. It may be, however, that the best place to run this box is in England, but we have not yet decided this. (3) Carburetter. We do not want to try and tie ourselves in too many knots with the float chamber venting. We suggest that if we can prevent the spray which comes out of the vent under exceptional conditions of heat getting on the sparking plugs, we shall be all right because we know it is difficult to set fire to the vapour under the bonnet. The same applies to petrol being thrown out of the vent when braking. We should like to try the drain pipe facing forward, in which case we believe the petrol would go down this rather than through the vertical vent pipe. With regard to the improvement made when the petrol pipe is taken out of the 'V' we should like actual temperatures to be measured inside and outside the 'V' to indicate how much we shall gain in temperature by this. | ||