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 to Maurice Wilks of Rover discussing a gearbox failure and requesting competitor vehicle weight data.
| Identifier | ExFiles\Box 127\3\ scan0264 | |
| Date | 29th October 1938 | |
| 1091 Rm{William Robotham - Chief Engineer}4/R.{Sir Henry Royce} 29th October, 1938. Maurice Wilks, Esq., The Rover Company Ltd., Oliver Street, COVENTRY. Dear Wilks, I am glad to see from the enclosed letter that the failure of the gearbox was not due to mal-treatment. Since the car had been running only about six months, I wonder whether Rovers are prepared to stand the cost of changing the gearbox. I could not return the car to you, because I thought it might do further damage. I am very pleased with the other modifications made to the car which have greatly improved it. Would it be possible for you to let me have some weight figures on the Vauxhall which I saw pulled down in your Works the other day ? In particular, I am interested in the integral body and frame construction. The back axle seemed to me to be extraordinarily light, but after talking to you about the engine power output, of course, it has not any very great power to transmit. If you could let me have some weight figures, I should be glad to give you in return any weight figures we have which might interest you. You know all about the Oldsmobile. We have the S.S. Jaguar,wts.,also 20 H.P. Vauxhall and our own Bentley. These were obtained by buying cars, and not as an'act of grace' from the manu-facturer, and so I do not feel it would be dishonest to pass them on to you. We shall shortly have the latest Buick analysed which may interest you. I shall be interested to know whether Taub managed to levitate his power plant to the advertised horse-power. I have now got a nice lot of figures obtained by modifying combustion chambers according to his figures, but I regret to say that in no single instance can I find that they revolutionise current practice. Briefly, we have got | ||