Up-and-Down Wiper Clears Entire Windshield

BLIND spots caused by snow or rain accumulating on the windshield are ended by this up-and-down wiper that extends the full width of the glass.

The wiper is operated by a threaded spindle—much like the lever wind mechanism on a fisherman’s casting reel—and pulls the snow or water down into a trough below the hood level.

You might be seeing this new invention, which received U. S. Patent No. 2, 880,444, on some German cars in the future. Its inventors, Bela Barenyi, of Stuttgart-Rohr, and Karl Wilfert, of Stuttgart-Degerloch, assigned it to Daimler-Benz,

A. G., of Stuttgart-Unterturkheim, Germany.

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The Drive-In is Thrivin’

America’s newest major industry was regarded as a newfangled novelty a decade or so ago. Now it’s become strictly big business.

By I. B. Neer

WITHOUT leaving the wheel of your car you can spend the most amazing vacation of your life this summer. For the drive-in is really thrivin’!

Without sliding from behind the steering wheel, you’ll be able, to deposit money in a bank, do all your shopping in supermarkets, buy a bouquet of flowers, mail a letter, go to church, pay your gas and electric bills, have prescriptions filled, get your laundry and dry cleaning done, take out insurance, check into a hotel, visit a zoo, have your shoes repaired and buy a bottle of Scotch for the long cool nights.

The drive-in as a big business may appear to have burst suddenly on the American scene, but actually the trend was being developed for more than 20 years. A few roadside restaurants made their first inquiring venture into the feed-’em-on-the-run field in the mid-20s and found it paid off handsomely.

Then businessmen in the cities, searching for a solution to the parking problem, took a cue from their country cousins. They started to convert their facilities so that motorists would be spared the wearisome hunt for an open spot on the traffic-choked streets. Again car owners hailed the innovation and before long Yankee ingenuity had developed a new industry.

Look what happened at Jackson Hole Wildlife Park near Moran, Wyo. On hand was the nation’s largest assortment of native big-game animals—buffalo, deer, elk, moose and antelope, last remnants of the vanishing American herds. The officials thought long and hard and finally leaped on the drive-in bandwagon as the best way to give tourists a real close-up of the animals in their native habitat.

Accordingly, they veined the large wooded area with a network of roads and strung almost invisible fences through the fields which keep the animals constantly in sight of motorists driving past. The herds cannot escape the enclosure because of a tricky device at the entrances. Timbers, criss-crossed along the first few yards of roads, are easy for a car to traverse but impossible for an animal.

Four years ago the Rev. Norman L. Hammer of North Hollywood, Calif., decided to do something about the 40 per cent slump in summer attendance at his Sunday services. Making a sort of one-man Gallup survey, he’ found that his parishioners were tempted by picnic grounds, beaches and golf courses come Sundays. Dressing for church, then rushing home to get into play garb, took too much time. So the pastor met his flock halfway.

He fitted up a pulpit in a parking lot behind his church and spread the word that parishioners could drop in on their way to play. First outdoor service was held on July 6, 1947, and soon swank convertibles and wheezing jalopies were pulling in side by side for Sunday morning worship.

Says the pastor with a twinkle in his eye: “The outdoors gets them on Sundays, but we get them first.”

Perhaps the most surprising development in the spectacular growth of the drive-in industry is the fact that such conservative institutions as banks have joined the parade. Eyebrows flew upward in financial circles back in 1936 when the City National Bank of South Bend, Ind., set up a teller’s window facing an alley and announced it was open for curb-service banking. But the idea took root and, according to the American Banking Association, has now spread to more than 500 institutions in 18 states.

The country’s largest and most elaborate drive-in bank is the Exchange National Auto Bank of Chicago, 111., where an average of 600 cars purr past the tellers daily, making 40 per cent of the total deposits. It is constructed in the shape of a huge U surrounded by driveways with ten tellers’ cages in the center. Attendants funnel the cars to the windows and tellers push out metal drawers into which customers drop money, bankbooks and necessary papers. Tellers and depositors communicate through a loudspeaker and microphone arrangement. If the services of a bank officer are needed, the tellers shoot him the papers via pneumatic tubes.

Drive-in theaters have come a long way since the first was opened strictly as a novelty outside Camden, N. J., in 1933. Hit by an almost disastrous slump during the war, they bounced back to the point where in Denver 7,000 persons waited two hours to see a movie, the first world premiere ever to be shown in a drive-in.

Some drive-ins which know all about baby sitting and home-chore problems, cheerfully tell patrons not to stay home on those accounts. They supply nurses and bottle-warming equipment and even do the family laundry while the show is on. The patron deposits a bundle of wash when he enters and gets it back clean when he leaves.

Rainy, windy or foggy nights used to strike deep gloom into the ranks of drive-in owners, but they don’t any more as the battle against the elements is being won. Scientists have now developed a glycerine compound which is sprayed on car windshields to drain off the downpour in transparent sheets instead of driblets. Steel reinforcements keep the huge 50 by 60-foot screens from swaying or toppling in high winds. DDT has banished the mosquito plague and fog-filters have been perfected so that projectionists can sharpen the picture when the mists descend.

The drive-in-and-dine spots come in two models—those in which cute car hops clamp food-laden trays to the car doors, and fully automatic ones which do away with waitresses, tipping and leg work. Perhaps the world’s biggest and swankiest drive-in beanery is the $750,000 edifice near downtown San Francisco, which sprawls over one and one-eighth acres and employs nearly 200 persons, including four traffic cops who flag customers into spots along the 250-car parking area. It serves more than 7,000 meals a day from two huge kitchens, filling each order in an average of six minutes. Otto E. Straub, the builder, spent eight years in an intensive study of food drive-ins before launching his enterprise.

The Motormat in Los Angeles, the first fully automatic drive-in restaurant, served 10,500 meals in its first nine days of operation a few years ago. A motorist parks in one of 20 stalls which fan out from a central, glass-enclosed kitchen. As he slips into place, a bin shaped like an old-fashioned breadbox shoots out from the kitchen on a runner and stops at the car door.

Inside the bin are glasses of water, a menu, a pad and pencil. The customer writes his order, pushes a button and the bin scoots back into the kitchen. In less than a minute, back comes the bin with the bill which must be paid before the meal is served. On its third trip the bin brings the order plus change.

With skyrocketing demand, there appears to be no limit to the types of business flocking to cash in on the curbside gold rush. The National Institute of Cleaning and Dyeing reports that roadside dry-cleaning places are opening by the dozen each week. Laundry field experts say that ten per cent of the nation’s laundry business is now transacted at windows which open on a driveway.

In many communities you can roll into a supermarket and make all your purchases without leaving the car. A California market sports a huge sign at the entrance: “If you don’t see what you want, just keep on driving until you do.”

Even the U.S. Government has become aware of the trend and stepped into line. In many cities, the post office has installed curb-side mailboxes with large gooseneck openings into which drivers can deposit mail without dismounting.

There’s really no end to the variations. The Detroit Edison Co. has opened an office where motorists can drive in, pay bills, leave appliances for repair, arrange for service and drive out. A number of insurance firms have set up offices in driveways and a drive-in night club is doing thriving business in Los Angeles.

In Beverly Hills, Calif., a drive-in liquor store has one rigorous rule. When a customer drives up, the salesman steps out, takes a good look and a big sniff. If he detects any tipsiness whatsoever, he sends the driver on his way. The store won’t sell liquor to drunks.

So, if you’re planning to hit the road this summer, don’t worry about missing the comforts and luxuries of home life. You can get ‘em in drive-ins. All you need is the car, the endurance—and the money. •

Vest-Pocket Life Preserver

DURING many an over-ocean, wartime flight as service inspector of B-24s in the China-Burma-India theater, Engineer Bill Baker’s thoughts of home kept reverting to a time when he. and his sister were lake sailing and their boat capsized, pinning the girl under the sail. Both escaped—but from then on his sister’s love for sail-boating was spoiled by her fear of the water.

Now, high above the Indian Ocean, Brother Bill glanced down at his Mae West life jacket and got an idea. Why not make a tiny life preserver, quickly inflated with carbon dioxide, for water sportsmen who often need life jackets but seldom carry them because of their bulkiness? After the war he finally perfected the Res-Q-Pak, which he (and we) hope will help reduce America’s annual drowning death toll of 7000 and bring confidence to those who aren’t too sure of their swimming ability.

Divers Explore New Depths in 1-Man Sub

DEEP sea explorers are now enabled to fathom the ocean’s secrets to a depth of more than 815 feet, thanks to the invention of a (living suit which has been dubbed the “one-man sub.”

Until recently divers could only descend to a depth of about 200 feet, while submarines could only go a little deeper, about 300 ft. In submarines it was not possible to work around in wrecked ships or examine the ocean floor.

The new diving suit, which amounts to an adjustable case carrying a crew of one man, permits minute exploration of the ocean bottom with complete comfort and the utmost flexibility of movement. The upper part of the suit has four windows of thick compressed glass and contains the signal and light controls, the valves and the instruments for measuring pressure and temperature.

The suit is made of Siemans Martin Steel and Fundit Aluminum and weighs only 1000 lbs. Depths attained are seen in drawing.

WHEELCHAIR CAR

HAROLD YOUNG of Downey, Calif., has a car designed expressly for wheelchair users. The driver gets in and out without help. Controls, including a push-stop, pull-go lever, are designed for the handicapped. The three-wheeler has directional signals as well as standard lights. Transmission uses a Togaloc clutch, chain drive to jackshaft, V-belt drive to rear wheels. The car has had years of all-weather use. •

Butyl ‘n Beautyon display at left herald a new style automobile inner tube designed to prevent the rapid deflation of air in the event of a puncture. Waffle-like construction causes a squeezing action around nail holes. Butyl is a synthetic rubber which retains air better than the natural product. The beauty—not synthetic—is Rae Caldwell.

Paris Motor Show in the French capital’s Grand Palais featured this white, two-seater midget—with its petite driver—and the unusual model car at right designed and built by Jean-Pierre Wimille, European road racing ace. The driver’s seat is in the center, as is the American “Torpedo” designed by Preston Tucker (see “Torpedo,” MI, Nov. ’46). This Position for the driver improves is visibility and judgment necessary for new high speeds.

Tiny Tims, all 6,000 pounds of them, cling to the wings of the Navy’s carrier-based AD-1 Skyraider, now in production at Douglas’ El Segundo, Calif., plant. The battery of Tiny Tims, two 12-inch and twelve 5-inch rockets, pack the explosive punch of a light cruiser surface ship. The AD-1 can carry a bigger load farther than any other plane of its type.

Also, henceforth I am going to use the spelling “computor”.

By the way, if you’re at all interested, this army training video detailing how an mechanical fire control computer works is amazing.

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Flying Missiles CAN Be Stopped!

Here is a sure-fire plan to down supersonic rockets like ducks—and wipe out the terror of sneak attacks.

By Frank Tinsley

HITLER was right when he ranted about the fearful havoc a “secret weapon” would wreak on his enemies. His V-2 rockets unleashed such terror on battered Britain that they nearly won the war—for the Nazis. For there was absolutely no defense against these mighty 3500-mph missiles—and no way to tell when—or where—they would strike next.

Today our military experts are still searching frantically for a weapon to kill the terrible menace of the V-2 type missile. Rocket specialists are concentrating on ground-to-air projectiles to intercept and destroy enemy rockets. But the experts admit that practical development of mechanical minute-men is years away. Right now, we are as wide open as a blind, broken-armed boxer— with still no defense against the knockout punch of the flying missile.

But even with the old ack-ack guns of World War II, high-flying supersonic missiles can be stopped. Here’s how we could set up a sure- fire anti-missile system this very moment: An enemy wants to blitz a key target— such as New York. Unlike wartime London, with rocket-launching sites just across the narrow English Channel, New York would be vulnerable only to long-range missiles— from another continent or—more probably—from rocket-firing subs off the coast.

Search radars—girding New York by ship and by high points from the outer tip of Long Island through northern Connecticut and the Catskills, then south and east around New Jersey—would warn of the attack and track the oncoming missiles. The nearest radar ship or station flashes by telemeter the exact bearing and position of each missile to the closest ack-ack batteries.

A central electronic brain controls the distribution of targets among the guns. Radars attached to every battery track the assigned target and keep close tab on the missile’s precise speed and trajectory. Instantaneous battery computors figure the lead, wind allowance and time of the shells to intercept the rocket. Then, based on these calculations, the guns point and fire the instant the target comes in range. As each salvo roars out to ring a missile, the computors pick a new aiming point for the guns and set ‘em up for the next blast.

Proximity fuses explode the anti-missile shells when they’re within lethal range of the target. When the shells go off, hardened steel balls hurl forward in overlapping cones so that the blasting projectiles form a circular, shotgun pattern, densest in the center. This deadly shrapnel wrecks the missile’s delicate mechanisms, throws it out of control or explodes it in midair.

Basis for this anti-guided missile setup is the recently revealed plan General Sir Frederick Pile, chief of Britain’s antiaircraft defenses during the war, developed in the hope of combatting the V-2.

Pile’s ingenious plan won the approval of Britain’s War Ministry in March. 1945, and might have checked the V-2 campaign. Before he could set up his system, however, the invading Allies overran the Nazis’ launching areas in France and Holland and cleaned out the V-2 bases. The plan then was buried away with other top secrets in the British war office.

To prevent surprise atomic attacks, defense rings could be maintained around every important target area in the United States. The cost in money, time and effort, of course, would be huge—but not so staggering as the destruction and panic that may hit our vital centers if they remain sitting ducks for rocket attacks. So, till our missile men finally do perfect those long-range counter-rockets, it’s comforting to know that we can stop flying missiles—with the equipment we have on hand today.

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IT’S NEW!

EMERGENCY FLOATS being tried here by Sikorsky S-55 helicopter can be inflated by pilot for any unscheduled landings on water.

TV COMBAT CAMERA developed by Army enables scout to send up-to-the-minute battle pictures to command post.

VACUUM CLEANER built by U. S. Hoffman Machinery Corp. weighs 15 tons, cleans runways of rubble to protect jet intakes.

SHOPPER’S MAILBOX, newly designed for people carrying a week’s provisions from the supermarket, was tried out recently in Washington, D. C. Foot pedal should be useful during Christmas rush.

EYE REACTIONS are recorded by camera as headclamped testee looks at boxes for Folding Paper Box Association’s study of sales appeal of various types of packages.

ARTIST IN STRAW. Berliner Friedrich Pruss von Zglinicke makes elaborate pictures of pieces of straw glued to wooden placards.

AVERT YO EYES. SUH! This lady is a cop and she’s hoisting her Roscoe. New holster is being tried out in Baltimore. Md.

HOLD IT! New TV tube (right) freezes selected images. Developed by Hughes Aircraft, it’s primarily an airborne radar weather aid. can retain an image up to three minutes for study.

DENTAL PANORAMA rivaling Grand Canyon is what you get with this new X-ray camera that takes all the teeth at one go.

TOY TRACTOR, radio-controlled, climbs 45-degree grades, can be operated at distance of over 200 yards. Made in Germany.

ROOF FIRST is the rule in new Army construction; concrete slabs for root floors, are raised on hydraulic hoists, then supporting walls are erected. Photo taken at Ft. Devens, Mass.

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MI Tests the Crosley ‘Hotshot’

By Tom McCahill

A “warm missile” is one way our English cousins might sum up the new Crosley “Hotshot.” Whatever you call it, though, this brand-new, miniature American sport car should prove a fiery shot in the arm to its big, somber American contemporaries. This new car is something to have fun with and enjoy—definitely not a vehicle to carry crepe at your grandmother’s funeral.

In a talk I had with Powel Crosley, Jr., recently, he told me he was going to take a crack at the sport-car business with the Hotshot. You can take it from me—at the price—$849 at the Cincinnati factory— it’s a very strong bid. It’s the poor man’s M.G. and zings along like a Mix Master version of a Mercedes.

I like Crosley himself because he still speaks to me despite some of the things I have written about his products. It gives me particular pleasure therefore to find myself so enthusiastic about the new Crosley.

This little car, as it comes delivered, will beat the fenders off any stock car of its engine size (44 cu. in.). Stripped down, with headlights, windshield, top and spare tire removed, the midget roadster turns into a racer and takes on a very continental look. At a quick glance, as the Hotshot whizzes down the road, you might readily mistake it for a Cisitalia or even a Ferrari.

Crosley has raised the compression ratio of his engine to 8 to 3. If you want to use the car in road races, you can hop up that ratio to 14 to 1. For such compression, of course, you will have to use gas with a very high octane rating. The engine also sports overhead cams and valving in the best racing tradition. As you know, overhead cams are as usual at Indianapolis as buttons on an overcoat. The engine, in its present standard form, develops 26.5 hp. As the entire rig weighs about 1000 lbs., the engine isn’t so small for this midget.

I drove a stripped-down Hotshot hard for over 200 miles on the parkways around New York City and was immensely impressed. At 70 to 72 mph (honest) I found it held the road remarkably well. When I hit turns at high speeds, I was frankly amazed at the little car’s cornering ability. The combination coil and leaf-spring suspension could be a lot stiffer for racing. Yet, in spite of this, I hit a lot of right-angle turns at 40 and 50 and I got around ‘em in one piece. The short, 83-inch wheelbase, however, can take most of the credit for its cornering characteristics.

The most obvious fault of the new Hotshot, in my opinion, are the 12-inch, baby-carriage wheels—same as those on the older Crosleys. I can’t think of a single thing to recommend them. Small tires, because of their limited surface, run far hotter than large ones, 18 or 19 inches in rim size—a definite hazard if you ever race the car over a long course.

Another reason I don’t like tiny tires on a car of this type is because it limits the car’s usage over rugged terrain. The M.G., for example, with its 19-inch wheels actually is used in England and Africa for open-field races across gulleys, ditches and stump-filled plains. If you tried this with the new Crosley, it would be completely disemboweled in a matter of minutes. The two bucket seats ride only 16 inches above level ground.

The Hotshot is the kind of a small car I would like to take across the fields in the fall hunting. But that would be impossible with 12-inch wheels.

While I’m sawing away at Mr. Crosley’s head, I’ll get my other two objections over fast, so I can get back to being sweet. The gear-shift handle is too far forward and awkwardly positioned for fast-racing shifts. My other complaint is this: The hatch cover-over the engine is secured by a lock anchoring it in the center front. At high speeds this cover vibrates like a Bronxite’s tongue “cheering” an umpire. All during my speed tests I thought the darn thing was going to break loose and separate me from my head.

Mr. Crosley, please add to your car’s looks and the driver’s sense of security by installing a good-looking hood strap in the best road-race tradition. A snappy strap would give your car $500 in extra dash and ease up on the racer’s ulcers. Couldn’t cost you more than a couple of bucks, per car. You’ll be doing everybody a favor, including yourself.

Now back to Tom, the fun-loving Rover boy. How would this poor man’s M.G. come out in a road race—such as the Bridgehampton clambake or the Watkins Glen Grand Prix— if it were pitted against the real McCoy, a British M.G.? Well, if M.G.’s Harry Rummins or Lea Francis’ Dudley Froy were driving Crosley’s Hotshots, they’d give any mediocre driver in an M.G. the worst afternoon of his life. The M.G. has a higher top speed by about six miles an hour over the standard Crosley Hotshot. But the Crosley will come close to matching the fancy British sport car in acceleration. I’m not kidding, either.

The M.G. would beat the Crosley’s brains out on the corners, but I’ll say it again: A Rummins or Froy driving, a Hotshot against an average guy in an M.G. would come pretty close to beating the M.G.

From zero to 50 mph with my extra-economy frame, I clocked the Hotshot at 17.6 seconds. But from zero to 60 it took 28.1 or almost ten seconds for the extra ten miles. Zero to 40 took 10.7 seconds. The Crosley has a flat spot in acceleration between 50 and 60 miles an hour in high. The payoff comes, however, in the time it took me to drive it a half mile from a standing start. This took only 36 seconds flat. I was doing approximately 74 mph at the end of the run.

I made several of these runs and they all were 36.1 seconds; 36.0 and 36.2. In other words, I went from 60 to 74 mph in almost 2 seconds less than from 50 to 60 miles an hour. At Indianapolis in May, the Sports Car Club ran an event which I attended, a race against time, one half-mile from a standing start. I can assure you that several M.G.’s in that race didn’t do as well for that distance.

This little Hotshot is scheduled to sell for less than $1000, delivered anywhere in America. It’s no M.G. in quality or performance, but, remember, it sells for only about 40 per cent of the price of the English job. In my opinion, the Hotshot’s a great little car in which thousands of people are going to have more fun than they have had with a car in years. It’s good-looking and sporty—should be a great favorite with anyone having a bit of an old swash buckle tucked away in them. At the price I heartily endorse Crosley’s Hotshot for having fun, blowing it up, hopping it up or just planting flowers. After all, on the market today, it’s the cheapest production-line form of transportation sporting four wheels. And that, brother, means something these days.

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Portland’s Zoo Railway

HAPPY tots and smiling adults ride around the new $3,859,000 Portland, Ore., zoo on America’s latest railway—the Portland Zoo Railroad Co. The rocket-styled, Diesel-powered Zooliner hauls three gleaming Skydome coaches and a luxurious club car which tote 99 adults or 132 kids. The pike is headed by famed Pacific Northwest author and historian, Stewart H. Holbrook, Chairman of the Board, and John H. Jones, President. All aboard!

Plane Drops Motor in Case of Fire, Then Lands as Glider

Danger of fire breaking out in an airplane engine in flight gives promise of being eliminated by the perfection of a new method of mounting motor and gas tanks which permits them to be dropped from the fuselage of the plane in case of fire. Joaquin Abreu of San Francisco is the inventor of the new motor-mounting device. The photo below shows how the mechanism is attached to a frame underneath the plane, from which it can be dropped at an instant’s notice by simply moving the release lever. After the motor has been dropped, the plane lands easily as a glider.

By the way, if you want to see just how much safer modern cars are than cars of this era, check out this video put out by the insurance institute on its 50th birthday. It’s a collision between a 1959 Chevy Bel Air and a 2009 Chevy Malibu. Guess who wins.

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McCahill Sounds Off On Safety

Uncle Tom blasts so-called “safety features” and suggests ten ways makers can cut traffic deaths.

By Tom McCahill

IN THE automobile business right now the topic of safety is as hot as a naked Chinaman in a barrel of tabasco. With various professors fronting for them and spouting statistics by the yard, carmakers in newly-tailored angel suits have set out almost en masse to halt highway slaughter.

Now this is a noble undertaking, the good Lord knows, and I am all in favor of anything that will save even one life on the road. But the trouble is, the safety campaign so far has not shown much evidence of being overloaded with realistic thinking. Maybe there are too many ivory tower thinkers doing the skullwork—and by my definition, based on plenty of close-range observation, a “safety expert” often means just a guy from out of town with a new gimmick.

But at risk of being tarred and feathered by my own definition, I guess I have as much right as the next guy to sound off on this safety kick, having spent more than 50,000 hours behind the wheel of hundreds of automobiles, many of them while working as a test-driver. So here goes.

Let’s start off with the manufacturer since he has swung into high gear screaming about safety features. My beef is that these “safety features” tend to lull the public into a false sense of security. And meanwhile the manufacturers are failing to do a lot of things which they could do and ought to do if they really want to cut down accidents and save lives. For instance, in the new car Owner’s Manual the manufacturer should emphasize, with pictures and easy-to-understand words, that this car —just like every other car—will have far slower pickup as weight is added in the form of passengers or luggage. We pointed out this simple but important fact on these pages almost ten years ago —but here goes again.

Take the biggest cars we have, with the biggest engines. Their 30-60 mph time can fall off anywhere from 25 to 40 per cent when two or three extra passengers are in the car. Unless you point this out to the owner he may have no way of knowing that the car he drives alone, five days a week on business, will become a death trap when he tries to pass a line of cars on a narrow highway on the weekend, when the weight of his wife and two in-laws has been added to the car’s load. With smaller cars this danger is even more acute. In my opinion many a serious accident has occurred because an ignorant driver did not realize that his car lost an amazing amount of its passing ability when he loaded it with additional weight. The safety boys ought to point this out, in type THIS BIG, and the Owner’s Manual is a good place to do it.

Another place where the manufacturers fall down on the job is in their recommended tire pressures. The maker of one huge car I tested recently still recommends 24 pounds of air all around, though this low pressure will make the car extremely bobbly and tough to control in an emergency at high speed. All stock car race drivers carry at least 50 pounds of air when racing these same cars. The manufacturer recommends 24 pounds because he wants his car to have the softest ride on the block. The Owner’s Manual should recommend two pressures: one for high-speed cruising, the other for short slow runs. In my years of testing I can recall a number of situations where most likely I’d have been killed at such low pressures but I squeaked by because I always carry at least 32 pounds, which gives me more bite and control.

Here we run into another school of thought which is extremely inaccurate: the hard-as-a-rock suspension philosophy. I’ve read dozens of articles indicating that all we need to make American cars safe is to give them rock-firm suspension similar to that of a Grand Prix Ferrari. Let me point out to the advocates of this school that in most cases suspension on American cars is too soft but that flint-hard competition suspension can be very dangerous too.

The suspension on many American cars has been improved immeasurably in the- last few years (since McCahill started beating the drums—Editor), and in some cars it is pretty close to perfect for our kind of roads. It may come as a shock to some of my readers to learn that over a rough course which includes dips and ruts, such as the Daytona Beach-and-road course, many standard American cars could murder some of the harder-sprung sports cars. In fact, most of those sports cars would be off the road in’ droves after hitting those obstacles while the American cars kept right on going. Mercedes has the right idea. The 300, for instance, is not sprung like a rock; its suspension is a nice compromise between an ice cube and melting ice cream.

Door latches have been given the full treatment, publicity-wise, during the last year. It is a well-known fact that a large percentage of fatalities in highway crashes has resulted from doors popping open and spewing the driver and passengers out on the pavement. Door latches have been improved—but only slightly. The manufacturers must know this. Doors equipped with the latest safety locks are still flying open on impact and NASCAR (National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing) still demands that the doors of all competing cars must be bolted and strapped shut before racing.

A couple of hunting companions of mine, riding in the latest model of an expensive car that has been featuring safety door locks regularly on television, were smacked broadside in New York City traffic by another car that ran through a red light. Both doors of my friends’ car flew open and both men were hurled to the pavement, one requiring a dozen stitches in his forehead and the other spending some weeks in the hospital with shattered ribs. If that car’s “safety” door locks had held, as advertised, it is doubtful if either man would have been scratched.

In the opinion of NASCAR president Bill France and myself there is only one way to make a real safety door lock. It must be designed like a bank vault bolt, with the locking end sliding into a groove in a steel girder which is part of a roll bar enveloping the entire body. Ideally there should be one of these Mosler-type bolts at both top and bottom, thus keeping the door firmly closed under nearly any impact. Detroit knows how to make such a lock. It would be expensive but it is the only solution to the problem of keeping doors from flying open. No “safety lock” I have seen so far will do this right now.

And here is another real safety feature which the manufacturers could and should provide to cut down unnecessary deaths on the highway: a steel roll bar. In the event of a roll-over the steel top on the latest style four-door hardtop provides no more protection for the passengers than a well-starched bedsheet. Roll bars are the answer. They can be concealed but they should be there. In the crash photos illustrating this article you will note that the drivers of both cars survived these 100-mile-an-hour roll-overs only because the doors were bolted together and because each car had a roll bar built into the roof.

Manufacturers have done a good job recently plugging safety belts (which we have been plugging on these pages for about ten years) but how about an educational program to get the buyers to use them? It should be pointed out that safety belts alone are not enough to prevent skulls from being fractured, faces from being gouged and a number of other unpleasantries. The ideal safety belt is not just a waist belt but a shoulder harness as well. This type of strap keeps the driver from parting his head in the middle on the rear-view mirror.

However, even a well-mounted waist belt is a tremendous advantage providing the driver knows how to use it correctly. The primary function of a good waist belt is to anchor the driver’s or passenger’s tailbone to the seat. This is no insurance that in the event of a sudden stop or crack-up his head won’t snap forward and conk any hardware in the way of his jack-knifing torso. But the Owner’s Manual can teach the driver how to “head for the cellar,” using the belt for a pivot before the roof falls in. The Manual should stress that the belt is a brace but not the overall answer to surviving a crash.

Here are a few more free-for-the-grabbing tips to manufacturers on how to keep their customers alive: Manufacturers should equip all cars with a mercury switch that will turn off the juice automatically when the car goes over, to prevent fire. Another area screaming for improvement is the current battering ram bumpers that have all the cush- ioned give of an anvil. Years ago we made cars with spring bumpers and some with hydraulic shocks that cut down impact violence considerably. And why were these given up? Because they cost a few extra bucks. But I have a hunch the average driver would gladly pay for bumpers that absorb some of the collision shock and help keep his teeth and tonsils separate.

And while I’m on this safety kick let me repeat the plea I’ve made so many times in the past—that manufacturers give more thought to improving out-of-round tires. Every “safety authority” in the business knows as well as I do that those lopsided doughnuts being sold today as “tires” can become extremely dangerous at high speeds when they develop gyroscopic action and can actually throw a car out of control. Manufacturers should tell the customers in plain words about wheel balancing and demand—repeat: demand!—the tire companies sell him perfectly round rubber for his wheels.

I see I just used the term “safety authority.” I recently had a long conversation with one of this tribe—a guy who has been widely quoted and televised as the greatest thing in safety since the invention of the diaper pin. During our talk I discovered this specialist in safe driving rarely does much driving himself, carefully avoids driving in heavy city traffic, never drives over 45 mph and averages less than 5,000 miles per year—just the guy to tell you how to handle today’s jet-propelled rigs on a six-lane turnpike where you’d be accused of creeping at anything less than 70 mph.

In all fairness, he was a first-rate statistician who could quote such fascinating facts as what percentage of highway accidents are caused by bearded men sneezing unexpectedly. Most of his information was based on analysis of police reports and he knew how many accidents involved drivers jumping stop signs, drivers intoxicated, drivers on the wrong side of the road, deaths caused by doors popping open, drivers scalped by sun visors, etc.

I guess all this is important but it is only part of the highway safety picture. When I asked this same character what he’d do if his car went into a slide at 45 mph or started to loop off a gravel road at 70 mph, he didn’t have a thing to offer. All he could suggest was that the driver was going too fast. This is great advice for a guy sideslipping off an icy corner, heading for an oak tree and wondering if maybe he skipped a page in the Owner’s Manual.

What I’m getting at is this: if manufacturers are sincere in their safety efforts— and I think they are—they should hire safety consultants who really know what it’s all about. Sure, university researchers and statisticians are important. But how about calling on the wisdom and know-how of men who drive, men who might not know a slide rule from a popsicle but can tell you what to do when the right front blows at 60 mph or when some gassed-to-the-eyeballs nudnick cuts you off on a rain-slicked turnpike.

A paid safety council of such men as Bill France, Lee Petty, Fonty Flock, Red Vogt and Bill Stroppe, all of whom know about crashes and how to live through them, would do more good than ten regiments of high-domed theorists who never lived through worse accidents than hitting their thumb with a tack hammer.

A council of race men could really make cars safe. Every manufacturer who has cars competing in the stock car circuits today had to hire outside race men to make his cars do their best and stay together while they were doing it. Race men like those named above can tell manufacturers exactly what’s wrong with their crates, how they can be improved and what can be added for more safety on today’s highspeed highways.

In summing up, here are ten sure-fire tips for any car-maker really interested in safety. 1. Tell your customers about the drop in acceleration time when the car is heavily loaded. 2. Give him two recommended tire pressures, for slow driving and for fast cruising. 3. Try for in-between suspension, not too soft, not too hard. 4. Install double door latches designed like bank vault bolts. 5. Install roll bars. 6. Give how-to-use instructions on safety belts in the Owner’s Manual and try to educate the customers into using shoulder harnesses. 7. Install mercury switches to prevent fire after a roll-over. 8. Design bumpers with some spring in them to help absorb shock. 9. Provide true-round tires and demand that tire companies sell true-round replacements. And finally, 10, set up a paid Safety Council of experienced race men to advise on new safety gimmicks and to rewrite the Owner’s Manual so that Elmer Snodgrass of Goosegrease, Idaho, can do more than take his hands off the wheel and cry “Mercy!” when his car goes into a spin.

Material and ideas published on these pages have been robbed, plundered and stolen many times in the past. Here is an open invitation to anyone interested to help himself to all or any part of the tips given above. It’s all up for grabs.

And if car manufacturers are looking for a slogan to spark their safety campaign, they could do a lot worse than borrow that old one from Frank Buck: “Bring ‘em back alive!” •

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NEW in SCIENCE

Sharpnel-Proof Vest is displayed by Pfc. Ralph Barlow of Redondo Beach, California. While in front line action in Korea, Barlow was hit by shrapnel and knocked to ground, but received no serious injury. Vest stopped the metal fragment.

Bell X-5 is undergoing tests at Edwards Air Force Base in California. It is our first plane able to change the sweep of its wings in flight from the most forward position, top, to a fully sweptback position, bottom, in 30 seconds. It is jet propelled.

Surfagage, precision device used by General Motors, detects scratches as small as one-millionth of an inch. It insures accuracy of finished surfaces of machined pieces and measures roughness of crankshaft, valve and precision parts in autos.

Solar Cooker is demonstrated in India’s National Physics Laboratory. The four-foot polished bowl concentrates the sun’s rays on the cooker and has power equivalent to 300 watts. It is hoped that, mass-produced, it will sell for $10 (U.S.).

Dummy Men will test new parachutes for the G.Q. Parachute Co., England, in the future. Made of steel and covered with rubberized foam, they weigh 182 lbs. and reproduce the behavior of a human body when dropped from high-altitude planes.

Bodygraph gives accurate measurements for tailoring. Felt vests of known dimensions are smoothed into place and have seams joined by photographic elastic bands. Form is registered when seams distend according to shape. D’Angelo, Paris, France.

Lubrication Platform for autos operates like a seesaw. It has a capacity of 1-1/2 tons and is adjustable for cars with wide tread. There is a clearance of four feet when one end is down. Made by Kurt George of Kasel, Germany, and sells for about $90.

Multimonica a novelty instrument, has two keyboards consisting of 41 keys each. With one it can be operated like any organ; with the other it produces tones electronically. It also has a built-in radio.

Shown at Fair in Frankfurt, Germany.

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RAILROADS IN THE SKY

Monorails promise swift and economical transportation for congested cities.

By Archie Robertson

HERE’S a brand-new way of travel for American commuters—the overhead, suspended train. In a monorail coach, light and roomy as a luxurious airliner and faster than a surface train, you will skim along above the crowded downtown streets, looking with thankfulness at your escape from a misery of crawling cars, traffic fumes, honking horns, whistling cops and squealing brakes. Whether you’re just going downtown to shop or commuting to work 50 miles from your home, a monorail will take you where you’re going two or three times as fast as conventional surface transportation.

The Houston, Texas pilot monorail that opened for demonstration purposes last winter is only 970 feet long, and passengers are allowed to ride free. But in other respects, it is very much like the full-length lines which its backers plan to build soon.

The single “rail” of the Skyway, as the Houston line is called, is a 30-inch pipe supported by 30-foot towers set at 50-foot intervals. At one end of the present line the passengers ascend to a loading platform; at the other the rail declines to bring the coach to ground level. The passenger car hangs below the rail; above it ride the two 305-hp engines, the control equipment and driver’s seat. The unit rides on eight pneumatic-tired wheels; 16 rubber guide wheels keep it in place on the rail. People who have taken the free trip report a nearly silent ride with little sense of motion. The coach has a Fiberglas body and large plexiglass windows; the effect inside is light, airy and cheerful. Seats along the sides accommodate 60 passengers and 50 more can stand comfortably.

The reasons for the monorail can be summed up briefly. Six million new cars coming along every year add to downtown traffic congestion which already causes an economic loss estimated in the billions. Conventional elevated roads and railroads block light and air from the streets below. Subways and surface railroads lose money. And aircraft aren’t yet ready for the job of carrying the public to work and back.

In several major population centers monorails are much closer to construction than the general public realizes. Their safety and dependability have already been proved in steel milk and other industrial plants, and full-scale plans for passenger-carrying monorails have been drawn for Los Angeles, San Francisco, Montreal, and Washington, D. C. The plan for Los Angeles awaits action by the California legislature, to enable the operating company to issue revenue bonds. It includes a 44-mile line between Fernando and downtown Los Angeles, with ten-car trains having a top speed of 100 mph. Even with 15 stops in this distance, the trains will maintain an average speed of 41 mph. This will make it by far the world’s fastest transit system. (New York subway expresses average only 24 mph.) The Los Angeles monorail system, designed by Gibbs & Hill, a New York engineering firm, will have automatic train control. Trains will berth themselves correctly at each station. Doors will open and close by themselves. The train attendant will ride up front in a plexiglass bubble to watch for possible obstructions, like a tall crane passing below. In this case, of course, he’ll be able to stop the train. Escalators will carry passengers up and down from the street.

One monorail plan eliminates bus-to-train transfers for off-line passengers. You’ll be able to board a bus at your usual corner to start your trip downtown. When the bus reaches its monorail station a steel frame will be lowered from the overhead rail. The bus will drive into it, the frame will lock around it and hoist it up. Without leaving your seat in the bus, you’ll be whisked over congested downtown areas to your destination.

The monorail is highly adaptable. In the Los Angeles plan, for example, it takes a dive underground to operate for two miles as a subway. Out in the country, its single row of pillars can be erected in the grassy, center strip which divides modern, separated expressways and thruways. Edward H. Anson, the vice president of Gibbs & Hill, has sketched a plan for a double loop monorail around the heart of Manhattan, with several cross-town lines to relieve congestion on the East-West streets. At rush hours, these are probably the scene of the nation’s worst traffic snarls with a staggering loss in time and money as a consequence.

Monorail enthusiasts, of course, do not claim that theirs is the only answer to the traffic problem. More thruways and expressways are needed, all engineers agree. But expressways and thruways fill up with new traffic jams almost as fast as they are built. The New Jersey Turnpike is now carrying the volume of traffic which it was expected to carry some 30 years hence. Also, deluxe new highways always bring more cars into town every day, to be parked—somewhere. And they cost a lot to build, not only because of their massive construction but because expensive property must be condemned to secure the right-of-way for a city freeway. To build one mile of modern automobile freeway costs from $4,000,000 to $6,000,000; a monorail line of the same length costs only $500,000 to construct.

When it comes to the number of people who can ride, the comparison is even more staggering. The monorail train—allowing for ten cars—can easily move about 24,000 passengers per hour, running on a 90-second headway between trains as in the Los Angeles design. Compare that with the mere 6,000-7,000 people who can travel a six-lane highway in private automobile during the same time—if we allow for the national average of about 1-1/2 passengers per car.

It doesn’t look as if we’re going to build many more miles of subway systems or suburban surface lines. Virtually no subways have been constructed since 1940. They cost about four times as much to build as monorails and they lose money, steadily. The New York subway system, the world’s greatest, runs deeper into the red every year as its passenger traffic declines while its fares go up. In general, the same sad story is true of commuters’ trains around New York, Chicago, Philadelphia and other large cities. Almost without exception their managements report that the trains are run at a loss, schedules are being curtailed or service being abandoned altogether.

Highspeed buses, or trains of buses, running on elevated tracks above the city streets have also been suggested. But an elevated roadway, of any kind, has the serious disadvantage of cutting off the light and air from the street beneath it.

Monorails of the present are not remotely like the old elevated railroads. On the Houston line, for example, the pillars are spaced 75 feet apart in a single row. The light, airy structure deprives nobody of sunshine and fresh air. There’s plenty of room for flowers and trees and no occasion for traffic accidents on the surfaces. Operations are quiet—no rumble, roar or clicking ties.

The monorail train isn’t a new invention. It-was proposed in England as early as 1830, and a few years later, a 20-mile line of single rail was built in the West of Ireland. A line was proposed to relieve New York traffic congestion in 1873.

Early monorails, however, were laid on the ground, or erected only a few feet above it, with engines and cars balanced upright on them. Such, for instance, was the famous, four-mile long Peg Leg Railroad in Pennsylvania, which opened in 1878 and unfortunately blew up a year later. The Bicycle Railroad— a similar design—skimmed along near Bellport, Long Island at 60 miles an hour, back in 1892. By 1901 an English monorail between Manchester and Liverpool was hitting 100 mph. In 1915 a monorail, elevated two feet above ground, ran between Bartow and City Island, N. Y. And of course for many years a little monorail car has been shuttling United States Senators underground between their office building and the adjoining Capitol.

The most famous existing monorail, however, is at Wuppertal, .in the Ruhr district of Germany. Nine and a half miles in length, it is a suspended, overbad type—like the new Houston line. It’s been running, without a single fatality among a total of 310,000,000 passengers, since 1902.

“Overhead, upside-down railroad,” though a clumsy phrase, may be a more accurate description of tomorrow’s mass transportation than the word “monorail.” While the Houston line has just one rail, the Gibbs & Hill design for Los Angeles is actually a narrow-gauge railroad, upside-down with the trains suspended from two rails, three feet apart. This split-rail design, engineers point out, makes switching a lot simpler than the single rail and offers other advantages. Rails, for example, can be enclosed inside a longitudinal box girder, treated with acoustic material, and they can rest upon a resilient, sound-deadening bed. Gyroscopes would not be necessary in the split-rail design. Even under stress equivalent to a 70-mph wind, the cars would lean less than 10 per cent from the vertical— less than some surface trains as they round a curve at high speed.

Maintenance costs on the monorail should be low. An enclosed track is safe from rain and snow. Brakes and motors on top of the cars are readily accessible for inspection and repairs.

What will it cost to ride it? According to the Los Angeles plan, the rate may be about 2.8 cents per mile which . compares with an average nationwide cost of 8 cents a mile for operating a privately-owned automobile. And no more than you pay now to ride a bus or train which is tied to earth.

Toy Air Limousine Has One Hundred Fifty Rubber Band Prop Power
A TOY produced by a western manufacturer is guaranteed to fly several hundred feet. It is equipped with 150 rubber band propeller power, and has a steering wheel, gauges, levers, in fact about everything that is found on a regular machine. The windows are of celluloid and the passenger department is luxuriously upholstered.

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THISH CAR RUNSH ON BEER

By Rudy Arnold

Liquor for this auto’s engine of distinction makes it run smoothly with that gurgling, surging power.

VERNON G. EISEL has what you might call a lush car. It will drink anything—and often does.

Pouring such barroom concoctions as beer, whisky or even soda into the fuel system of his ’53 Olds makes it purr like a kitten.

The secret, according to Eisel, who lives in Levittown, N. Y., is the “caveator” which lies beneath the hood and gives the car its gurgling, surging power.

Eisel normally pours water into the cavitator which functions satisfactorily on almost any liquid that can be turned into steam. Made with standard steam fittings and connected to the carburetor, Eisel claims his cavitator mixes vapor bubbles and gasoline in the carburetor. The exploding force of the bubbles, added to the force of the gasoline exploding in the cylinders, increases the engine’s power, he says.

When his cavitator is perfected, predicts Eisel, it will eliminate the need for an oil or air filter. You will never have to grind valves or clean spark plugs because there won’t be any carbon deposits and your engine will run smoother and with more power. Eisel claims he gets 25 per cent increase in gas mileage and from 25 to 40 per cent more power.

“…Dr. Porsche’s engineering with such cars as the SSK had the same head-spinning effect as a pipeful of poppy dust to a Chinese playboy.”

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MI Tests the German Porsche

If money is no object and you are looking for a small competition car that’s really loaded with TNT, this is it, our Uncle Tom reports.

By Tom McCahill

THE late Dr. Ferdinand Porsche was the Hopalong Cassidy of the automobile business. For 50 years he engineered mouth-watering cars for generations of big boys to dream about. What Hopalong does for the kids today, old Doe Porsche did for their old man’s old man by building cars with all the intrigue of a Left Bank dive. His fame started back in 1900 with the chassis and power plant of the Austro-Daimler and really came to a boil with his SSK Mercedes and later the famed Auto-Union. Doctor Porsche got more sex appeal on four wheels in a single day than Minsky could cram on a runway in 30 years. To the real gone automotive nut, Dr. Porsche’s engineering with such cars as the SSK had the same head-spinning effect as a pipeful of poppy dust to a Chinese playboy.

‘Before the war he designed the now well-known Volkswagen. This was strictly a political football of the Nazi party and never did get into real mass production until after the war when it was reborn with Marshall Plan dough. During the war years, and for nearly two years afterward while the aging Doctor was in a prison camp, he kept himself alive with ideas for a real gold-plated, luxury competition Volkswagen.

He knew his Volkswagen design was close to perfect for a small inexpensive car. His 50 years of engineering experience were in it and he had licked the bad characteristics that had made man-killers of his rear-engine, Grand Prix Auto-Unions, even though they were among the fastest cars ever built. The Volkswagens quickly proved themselves on these shores after they were introduced by Max Hoffman several years ago (see October 1950 MI).

One of the best compliments I ever heard any car receive was made unconsciously. I was sitting in George Schrafft’s Palm Beach Foreign Motors last winter, shooting the breeze, when a little Volkswagen whizzed by. “That’s Mrs. So and So,” George remarked. “We sold her that job early last fall. She’s never even been back for service. You know, we rarely ever see those Volkswagens again after they’re sold. That’s one job our service department would go broke on—nothing ever seems to go wrong with them.”

This was not said to impress me, it was just part of a casual bull session. George doesn’t make enough dough selling Volkswagens to pay his light bill. His take comes from the Jaguars, Rolls and other big cars he handles. But his offhand remarks were a terrific compliment to old Doc Porsche.

The first Porsche to hit this country arrived a little over a year ago. Early buyers such as Thorne Donnelley and Bill Spear would spend hours bending your ear about the “super deluxe Volkswagen’s” handling qualities. Like the Volkswagen, the early Porsche had a small 1 1/10-litre engine (about 67 cubic inches), only the Porsche engine was a much more refined and expensive piece of machinery. Instead of the heavier Volkswagen block, aluminum alloy was used and this expensive type of construction was utilized throughout the whole car. Some months later, on the demand for more torque, the engine size was boosted to 1-1/3 litres (about 81 cubic inches) and today the Porsche is a full 1-1/2-litre job which makes it a baby tiger due to the car’s light weight of about 1,600 pounds.

The real automotive connoisseur took to the Porsche from the opening gun although the casual sports car fan was backed off by the immodest appearing price tag. The 1-1/2 litre convertible costs approximately $4,500 and the hardtop coupe about $300 less. Of course, this is small change in the Ferrari league but it is still expensive money for a car not much bigger than the average-size bathtub.

Max Hoffman, America’s largest foreign car distributor and Porsche major domo on these shores, personally demonstrated a few Porsche tricks at the Sports Car Club of America’s Equinox Hill Climb last October. Max literally creamed the boys with a stock Porsche despite the worst conditions under which such an event was ever run. Through snow and ice he beat his closest Class 4 rival by more than 18 seconds in the 2.7-mile event. Actually he made far better time than many of the bigger cars in the unrestricted class, including XK 120s and Aston-Martins.

Later at Palm Beach Shores in December, Max in a competition Porsche put on the wildest driving demonstration ever seen in a road race in the U. S. Not content merely to trim the opposition, Max lapped the field and was on his way to the biggest one-sided class victory ever recorded in a sports car race when something went wrong with the cooling system air adjustment and the car was forced to retire. Though Max didn’t win this race, the connoisseurs were bug-eyed at the way the Porsche whipped by blown MGs, HRGs and their ilk. At the Vero Beach 12-hour race, two Porsche coupes gave a remarkable endurance performance. For the whole 12 hours these two 91-cubic-inch cars were right on the tail of Bill Spear and Phil Walters, who were driving a 2.3 litre Ferrari. The Porsches were pushing 100 mph on the straights consistently and at the finish they still were going as if the race had only started. There could be no doubt left in anvone’s mind after the Vero Beach clambake that Dr. Porsche had built himself one hell of an automobile just before he died.

How about it, is the Porsche a good buy? From the stand- point of a true connoisseur who also has a bucket full of loose change, yes. This is a car for the guy who appreciates fine gems, paintings and the best of everything. Frankly, it doesn’t look like the price to the quick eye. There are an awful lot of good cars that can be bought for this kind of scratch. Jaguars, Cadillacs, Allards and Siatas, just to name a few. You can buy faster cars and you can certainly buy bigger cars for this money. But $4,500 won’t buy you a better car even though the Porsche has one drawback, to my way of thinking, and that’s the crash box transmission.

After a few miles in the Porsche I tested, I found that with care you could handle all shifting up and down without double-clutching except to get in the lowest gears from top. It was sort of fun, as it puts the driver on his driving mettle. After a week or so, I feel even the Hydramatic kids would have the handling technique down cold, so perhaps this is only a temporary drawback for the guy who takes pride in his driving.

I won’t go into the virtues of Dr. Porsche’s air-cooled pancake engine as this has already been discussed on these pages before and, besides, the name pancake engine makes my teeth chatter. In the dark days of the depression I had a job for about a year as the head auto electrician for a huge bus company. I worked from seven at night until five every morning and during the winter the company acquired a fleet of pancake buses. Many a snowy night I crawled under these things on the road when the ignition got wet and even though I had genuine built-in hair on my noggin in those days, my head felt like an ice cube most of the time. These damn engines were installed so close to the ground under the chassis that you couldn’t even wear a hat when working on them. A snow pillow, night after night in zero weather, is not McCahill’s idea of a hot time.

The Porsche I tested belonged to (surprise) Briggs Cunningham. It was a well broken-in job with close to 5,000 hard miles on the clock, including a class win at Palm Beach Shores when Briggs drove it to cop the Kiwanis Trophy for cars up to 1500cc displacement. Now, the Porsche has been over here less than two years and during that time it has undergone an almost continuous series of alterations and improvements, including three changes in engine size. The very latest 114-litre Porsche has a beefed-up crankshaft, a hotter cam and additional competition refinements, including a generous chrome plating of many internal parts. The latest 1952 jobs are rated at 65 horsepower and are supposed to wind up to close to 90 in third and have a top speed in high of over 100. Briggs’ car, though only a few months old, was not that hot by a long shot but here’s bow his job shaped up. Zero to 60 took 14.6 seconds. Zero to 30 went 5.3 and zero to 50 took 9.8 seconds. Top speed on a measured mile showed 94.16.

This is fantastic performance for a 91-cubic-inch engine, considering the car’s size though not its weight. The front seat is as big as my Mark VII Jag and there is loads of room for a month’s supply of clothes or three medium-sized midgets behind the seat. The big payoff comes in the way this rig handles and comers. On fast turns and bends the car remains as flat as Stalin’s head. In real right-angle stinkers, old Doc Porsche’s trailing suspension gets it around like a drunk passing a temperance meeting.

As this story goes to press, the sports car characters are reasonably agog over the forthcoming debut of the new Porsche competition roadster, which will develop 75 horsepower and is supposed to hit a top speed of 106 mph. If this job is as good as it sounds, it will murder everything else in Class F, which includes the HRG, Singer, MG and all other cars displacing between 67.1 and 91.5 cubic inches.

The Porsche is a car for the real fancier, the automobile man who demands the best of everything, even in small packages. It’s a car for the guy who pays $1,500 for a Purdy shotgun and $250 for a business suit. And it’s a car for the man who wants the very finest in a class or formula competition automobile.

SPECIFICATIONS

MODEL TESTED:
German Porsche 1-1/2 litre convertible

ENGINE:
4 cylinder, air-cooled OHV pancake-type; bore 3.2 inches, stroke 2.9 inches; brake horsepower 65 @ 4000 rpm; compression ratio 7.2 to 1.

DIMENSIONS:
Wheelbase 83 inches; overall length 152 inches; tread 49-3/4 inches front, 49-1/4 rear; width 66 inches; height 51 inches; weight 1,600 pounds; standard tire size 5.00×16; gas tank 12 gals.

PERFORMANCE:
0 to 30 mph, 5.3 seconds.
0 to 50 mph 9.8 seconds .
0 to 60 mph 14.6 seconds.
Top speed, 94.16 mph

SPEEDOMETER ERROR:
At 60 mph on speedometer, actual speed 57.14 mph

Automobile Sleigh Develops Speed of 35 Miles an Hour on Snow Roads
LESTER COBB, of Norway, Maine, has invented an automobile sleigh which will not mire in ruts or drifts of snow. It drives and operates like an automobile. A paddle arrangement gives it traction. The auto-sleigh is geared for rapid traction and 35 m.p.h, is a comfortable speed with it. It is declared that the deeper the snow the faster the speed of the sleigh.

One Way To Get There!

THE Edward Joneses and their year-old baby made the 1,591 mile trip from Chicago to Miami, Fla., in perfect comfort—so they say—in this strange vehicle. It is a dual bicycle joined by a welded frame.

World’s First Motor Coach Sleeper Compared with Huge Monoplane
THE world’s first motor coach sleeper has been completed with accommodations for twenty-six sleepers. There are upper and lower berths similar to those of an elaborately fitted Pullman car. The sleeper was taken to an airfield for comparison in size with the Ford monoplane.

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Number One Rocket Man

A Silhouette of the Shy Massachusetts Physicist Who Pioneered in Rocket Research . . . Much to His Distress He Broke into the Noisier Newspapers

By G. EDWARD PENDRAY
Past President, the American Rocket Society
Editor of Astronautics

ON a flat, dry plain, 18 miles north of Roswell, New Mexico, rises a 60-foot tower of steel that has roused more curiosity, and has probably had a greater influence on the future of the world, than any other feature of all New Mexico’s arresting landscape.

From this tower, at irregular intervals, a Massachusetts physicist and his assistants send roaring into the skies certain gleaming, cigar-shaped projectiles of metal, powered by gasoline and liquid oxygen, and landed by parachutes.

The physicist is Dr. Robert Hutchings Goddard, a bald, spare, pleasant man who will be 56 years old next October 5 (1938). Rocket experimenters the world over recognize him as their Number One man. Not only has he made more contributions to the new field of rocket engineering than any other one individual, but it was Dr. Goddard who launched modern rocket research with his clear presentation of the possibilities of rockets, both their limitations and advantages, 19 years ago. His publication, modestly entitled “A Method of Reaching Extreme Altitudes,” was published by the Smithsonian Institution in 1919.

DR. GODDARD at that time had already been a rocket experimenter for nearly ten years. His first trials were made during some studies of the upper atmosphere while he was an instructor at the Worcester Polytechnic Institute, in 1909. Baffled by the uncertainty and limitations of sounding balloons, he imagined that by building some kind of huge skyrocket he could shoot self-recording instruments high into the stratosphere and bring back information of value to science.

This idea of reaching high altitudes with rockets was by no means new with Dr. Goddard. In fact, we are told that a certain Chinese mandarin in the 13th Century sought to lift himself to the moon by fastening rockets to the legs of his chair. Cyrano de Bergerac, the novelist, wrote a story 300 years ago in which the hero transported himself by rocket power. Warmen saw in rockets a potential carrier of explosives centuries ago, and in the Napoleonic wars rocket brigades blossomed in Europe. In the siege of Boulogne, the English succeeded in setting the town afire with rockets designed by Sir William Congreve.

But those early efforts were rule-of-thumb procedures, and really came to little. What Dr. Goddard proposed, 29 years ago, was to apply the methods of modern engineering to the construction of rockets. He perceived that several diverse and complicated problems would have to be tackled, seriatim: (1) the fuel, (2) the materials, (3) the methods of feeding the fuels, (4) the aerodynamic design, (5) control in flight, (6) the further unknowns.

For the rocket, though a seemingly simple device, is really very complicated. It works by recoil—by application of the ancient principle that every action has an equal and opposite reaction. The action is produced by rapid combustion and simultaneous ejection of gas at high velocity. The reaction occurs in the body of the rocket, which flies at an accelerated rate in the direction opposite that of the ejected gases.

Had Dr. Goddard been a less practical man he would have been content to write an article about the idea, or give a lecture on it, and sit back to await the development at someone else’s hands.

But it happened that he was of the sort who undertake to test their notions before they talk about them. The only successful examples of rockets in his day were skyrockets and life-saving rockets— both powered by modified gunpowder. Beginning at this point, Dr. Goddard tested powder fuel rockets. As new teaching appointments took him to Princeton, and then to Clark University, the idea went with him.

Talk of rockets is so commonplace today—such success has attended the efforts of experimenters—that rocketry is almost respectable. But in the old days of 1914 and earlier, few sane engineers spoke of them except humorously, and physicists who entertained the idea of rocket transportation must have been as rare as one-armed flute players. Nevertheless, Dr. Goddard succeeded, one by one, in convincing his colleagues. In 1914, plugging away on his own, he took out two basic patents on rockets, pertaining to combustion chambers and nozzles. A short time later he talked the problem of rocketry through with Dr. Charles G. Abbot, Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution. So convincing was his argument that the conservative old Institution agreed to grant him modest funds for a series of experiments. In the tests that followed, Dr. Goddard demonstrated that rockets really need no air to push against, and that they are capable of development. He also proved that gunpowder-like fuels must be abandoned in favor of more powerful, more easily controlled kinds, probably liquefied gases.

Thus started what rocket engineers now refer to as the era of “liquid-fuel” rockets—the real beginning of scientific rocketry. Simple calculations show that the most powerful release of energy, pound for pound, occurs during the combustion of carbon or hydrogen with oxy- gen. The problem was to produce this combustion at the right time, in the right place, and under the right conditions.

After some preliminary trials, Dr. Goddard decided that the best fuel would be a chemical combination of hydrogen and carbon, as in gasoline, and that oxygen could most conveniently be supplied in the pure form, liquefied. These early tests were carried on very secretly near Auburn, Massachusetts, and apparently were the first “proving-stand”‘ experiments with liquid-fuel rocket motors —primitive, to be sure, but they set the foundation upon which a great deal of experimental work has since been built. Dr. Goddard tried out liquid oxygen and various members of the hydro-carbon series, including gasoline, kerosene, liquid propane, also ether. He finally discarded the others and settled on gasoline and oxygen. Virtually all of his experiments since have been made with these.

By 1923 he felt ready to try an actual liquid-fuel rocket. On November 1 of that year he completed and tried out a small one on his proving-stand, tying it down so it couldn’t fly. It seemed promising, but wasn’t good enough. For one thing, there was the problem of getting the fuels from the tanks into the combustion chamber fast enough. He had used small pumps on the rocket, but pumps are slow, heavy, and troublesome.

IT took two more years to overcome that problem. In December, 1925, he completed and tested a second liquid-fuel rocket in which the fuels were forced into the chamber by the pressure of an inert gas, nitrogen. This method worked well, but still the experimenter cautiously denied himself the experience of turning it loose to see it fly.

That pleasure was reserved until three months later, when on March 16, 1926, at Auburn, he put an improved liquid-fuel rocket into his improvised launching rack and let her go. So far as I have been able to find evidence, this was the first actual flight of a liquid-fuel rocket in this country or anywhere in the world. It was in no sense a public shot. The only witnesses were Dr. Goddard and a couple of helpers. The experimenter timed it with a stop watch and later reported that it fired for two and a half seconds, during which time it flew 184 feet, “making the speed along the trajectory about 60 miles an hour.”

A queer-looking rocket it was, too, compared with the sleek projectiles Dr. Goddard’s shop in New Mexico now turns out. The fuel tanks were slender tubes, placed one behind the other. The motor, consisting of the combustion chamber and its exhaust nozzle, was well ahead, supported on spidery arms which also carried the fuel lines. The whole contrivance was about ten feet long, but only about half of this length was actual rocket; the rest was the harness that joined the motor to the tanks. Pressure to force the fuels into the combustion chamber was furnished by an outside pressure tank and, after launching, by an alcohol heater carried on the rocket.

The idea of putting the motor ahead of the tanks was the mistaken one that this method of “pulling” the rocket, instead of pushing it, would make it fly better. In practice it did nothing of the kind; it only added to the difficulties of construction. Dr. Goddard abandoned the design at once in favor of rockets with the motor at the rear. Between 1926 and 1929 he shot a number of these, with varying success.

And then, quite unexpectedly, Dr. Goddard broke into the newspapers— much to his distress. Naturally reserved and somewhat uncommunicative, he had early discovered what most rocket experimenters find out sooner or later— that next to an injurious explosion, publicity is the worst possible disaster. (Most newspaper writers still seem to believe that every rocket is aimed at the moon.) It was his shot of July 17, 1929, at Auburn, that brought Dr. Goddard this great and unexpected burst of notoriety. The rocket was a fairly large one, carrying a small barometer and a camera. Being large enough to carry instruments, it also made a great deal of noise. Neighbors telephoned the police that an airplane had crashed in flames. A few ex- cited Auburnites were certain a meteor had fallen. When fire and police departments arrived, they found only a rocket experimenter, examining the remains of his rocket, pleased at the notable fact that his instrument, shot several hundred feet heavenward, had parachuted gently back from the flight and landed intact.

But the simple facts were by no means enough for the newspapers. Some, of course, had sensible stories, but they were in the minority. It was widely reported that he had shot a rocket to the moon, but had failed, that his rocket had exploded, that it had contained tons of explosive, that his intentions were to fly to Mars.

Fortunately the flurry was short-lived. Also, it had some good results, for it is said that as a result of the publicity Col. Charles A. Lindbergh first became interested in Dr. Goddard and his rockets. At any rate, it was in 1929 that the flyer brought rocketry to the attention of the late Daniel Guggenheim. The result was a grant that made possible the present establishment in New Mexico, under conditions that many experimenters consider ideal for rocket research.

About three miles north of Roswell, a shop 30 by 55 feet was erected, and near it a 20-foot tower built for proving-stand tests of motors and rockets. Fifteen miles farther north, on the plains, stands the 60-foot launching tower from which actual rocket shots are made. The region thereabout lias an altitude of about 3500 feet—enough to reduce noticeably the resistance of the air to rapid flight, as compared with the denser air at sea level. The country is level and open. There is space for high experimental flights without much danger of the rocket landing on an indignant bystander.

Gasoline and liquid oxygen, mixed, form a peculiarly violent detonator, yielding about five times as much energy pound for pound as TNT. Dr. Goddard has taken what may seem like extreme precautions against accident and injury. At the launching tower, all experiments are managed by remote control. The operator and observers are stationed 1000 feet away, in a shelter protected by sand bags on the roof. The observer whose task it is to clock the rocket flight, and who therefore cannot conveniently work from a shelter, is stationed 3000 feet from the tower. For close observations, to watch the firing, launching, and so on, there is a concrete dugout 50 feet from the launching tower. The observer looks through four-inch peepholes in a tilted slab of concrete three inches thick.

THE rocket motor used by Dr. Goddard in his New Mexico shots is 5% inches in diameter and weighs five pounds. It usually fires about 20 seconds, and delivers a maximum thrust of 289 pounds. Such a motor can hoist a real projectile into the air, and such, indeed, have been the projectiles that Dr. Goddard has been attaching to them. His first New Mexico rocket was shot on December 30, 1930. It was 11 feet long and weighed 33.5 pounds without fuel. It reached an altitude of 2000 feet, and a maximum speed of 500 miles an hour.

This was only the beginning. Heavier, more powerful rockets were to come. In August, 1934, the experimenter shot a pendulum-controlled rocket that made an altitude of 1000 feet, then turned horizontally for 11,000 feet, landing a little over two miles from the launching tower. At one point its velocity touched 700 miles an hour.

In none of these shots was altitude or speed the chief object. The experimenter, having tentatively solved, in order, the problems of fuel, material, methods of feeding the fuel, and aerodynamic design, was by now working on the hardest knot of all—control. Specifically, he was trying to build a rocket that would be capable of sure, dependable upward flight. After 25 years of experiment his eyes were still on the stratosphere.

Now there may be some trick of aerodynamics or design that will guarantee vertical flight without special control mechanisms and the extra complications they entail. Many rocket experimenters hope so, but to date they haven’t discovered it. After his early experiences with cantankerous projectiles, whishing through the air at express speed but fol- lowing whimsical air-paths all their own, Dr. Goddard decided that a gyroscopically-operated control mechanism would have to be devised.

In the beginning he tried some other devices, notably the pendulum, but these depend on gravity and are affected by the course and acceleration of the rocket. The gyroscope, however, holds its position with relation to space, regard- less of the torque or acceleration of the projectile carrying it.

The main problem was to construct a sensitive servo-mechanism that would steer the rocket back on course without disturbing the gyro. Dr. Goddard’s idea was to have small vanes pushed into the path of the exhaust gases in such a manner as to deflect the flight. In his first trial the system didn’t work as well as expected. The performance led the physicist to suspect that the vanes were too small, and he resolved later to try again with larger ones.

The improved system worked better. The vanes, driven by gas pressure into the rocket exhaust stream, were set to apply controlling force when the axis of the projectile deviated as much as 10 degrees from the vertical. The finest shot so far reported with this system reached an altitude of 7500 feet. Rising slowly from the launching tower, the rocket undulated from side to side as the gyro-control continually corrected the course. “The first few hundred feet of the flight,” reported the experimenter, “reminded one of a fish swimming in a vertical direction.” After the rocket had gained more speed, the curves smoothed out.

Such a flight, of course, is not ideal. Much power is lost in useless undulations. But flight control had at least been started, and the physicist of Worcester could check off one more step in the series of conquests leading to the de- velopment of the rocket. Still before him are those problems classified as “the further unknowns.” One of them is the problem of reducing the weight of the rocket, for every extra ounce requires extra fuel to lift it, and extra fuel to lift the extra fuel, ad infinitum. There are no filling stations on the route to extreme altitudes. The rocket must start with a full tank, and one filling is all it can expect.

Other problems are those of improving the efficiency of the rocket motor, which is still far from that which is theoretically expected; improving the aerodynamic design for flight at super-sonic velocities; smoother control; and a surer technique for releasing the parachute or other landing apparatus at the exact top of the flight.

IN justice it should be said that Dr.

Goddard is no longer alone in the colossal task of mastering these difficulties. All over the world, since 1928. rocket societies and rocket experimenters have sprung up, some to make a few tests and drop the subject, others to plow on toward the goal as doggedly as does Dr. Goddard himself. In this country there are at least 20 other active experimenters, and a rocket society that numbers nearly 300 members. In England an experimental group has about 50 members. There are rocket experimenters in Austria, Russia, France, Japan, New Zealand, Canada. The American Rocket Society has an active affiliate at Yale University. Other American universities are considering the establishment of affiliate groups of experimenters among their engineering students and faculties. California experimenters cross the continent to report their work in New York before the Institute of Aeronautical Engineers.

Dr. Goddard’s work thus may have opened a new era in transportation, for rockets can do more than explore the upper atmosphere. They ultimately may carry mail and goods—and possibly even passengers—with speed rivaling that of the telegraph; usher in an epoch of swift communication more spectacular than that brought by the telephone and airplane; alter once more the complexion of civilization as only basic inventions can alter it.

It was Col. Lindbergh who, in a letter recently to the President of Clark University, put the matter most directly: “The rocket is now in that most interesting period of discovery where the shore lines are unplotted and the future limited only by imagination. We cannot state what speeds or ranges the rocket may attain, but it is not restricted by the rotation of an engine or by dependence on the atmosphere.

“As the airplane gave man freedom from the earth, the rocket offers him freedom from the air.”

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TV’s Sheet-Metal Heroes

Here’s how Grandpa’s Pierce-Arrow might end up on television, co-starring with Bob Stack

By JACK B. KEMMERER

“I’M a co-star with a bunch of old cars,” moans Bob Stack, I relaxing between takes on the studio set of The Untouch- ables. “And if you don’t believe it, take a look at the fan mail. I wouldn’t be surprised if they get more mail than the rest of us put together.”

The Untouchables, ABC-TV’s tale of gangsters and government men in the ’30s, quickly skyrocketed to high popularity in the United States soon after its first appearance on the TV screen. And cars on the program share fan appeal with the human cast.

The series is filmed at Desilu Studios, Culver City, Calif., where the beloved old sheet metal stars even have their own private parking lot. The lineup is impressive: a 1927 Viking, a whole platoon of Buicks, a Pierce-Arrow here and there, a Chevy coupe, some Fords, a couple of Oldsmobiles, lots of LaSalles, both a Yellow and a Checker Cab, and three trucks, a White, a 1925 chain-drive Mack, and a Chevy—about 50 cars in all.

Gold Behind Chicken Coop? Where does the show get all these vintage cars? Aaron Dorn, Desilu’s transportation chief, has the answer—and the job of finding the particular cars needed. Many are offered to Dorn by Untouchables’ fans who figure they have a gold mine in their grandpappy’s old car out behind the chicken coop.

“Lots of people make us a fine offer of a ’27 or ’29 car for maybe only $5000,” Dorn said unhappily. “But the truth is, there are plenty around for a tenth of that. The only catch is, they must be in good mechanical shape.”

Actually, Dorn gets most of his cars from E.O. Smith who owns and operates a Hollywood rental and referral service for old cars. At 59, Smith is one of those rare individuals who retired several years ago, then turned a hobby into a lucrative business.

He took up the hobby about 10 years ago, buying a 1925 Stearns four-door sedan. After acquiring about seven or eight of the ancient cars and restoring them to mint condition, he found that considerable money and even more time were tied up in something that could only be looked at and driven occasionally.

Cars for Lawless Years. “I knew I had to find some way of making them pay or my hobby was over,” Smith recalls. Some weeks later he heard that M-G-M was looking for cars of the 1920s for a new TV series, The Lawless Years.

Driving one of his cars to the lot, Smith showed it, along with pictures of his other cars, to the transportation chief. Several cars were “signed up” immediately and Smith had a new business. Now, only three years later, he has about 65 vintage cars and is constantly adding more. He supplies cars to every movie studio in Hollywood as well as to television production companies.

Smith belongs to the Antique Car Club and the Horseless Carriage Club; most relics come from members of these two organizations. And, now that he’s well known in the field, Smith gets three or four letters and calls a day from people wanting to unload an old car. “Unfortunately,” he says, “most of these people have an exaggerated idea of what their car is worth.”

Judging the Value. There is no set price for an antique or classic car, according to Smith. It depends entirely on the car’s condition, its rarity, and how bad the would-be purchaser wants it. The least Smith ever paid for a car was $30 for a 1934 Oldsmobile; the most: $1000 each for a 1913 International truck and a 1918 Cadillac. A 1918 Dodge cost him $750 and a 1915 Model T Ford, $900. Each required considerable work to restore; in addition to the time involved, about $500 was spent on each car.

With the exception of major mechanical overhauls, Smith does all restoration work. Body work alone requires about two weeks’ labor and can easily take two months if the car is in really bad shape. He farms out his mechanical work to a neighborhood garage run by another antique car fan who thus has a personal interest in Smith’s problems.

Spare parts can be—and often are—a big headache. If Smith can’t find an engine part, he has it machined. Body parts are easier to come by; here again, Smith depends mostly on his fellow car club members.

The First Car He Bought (a 1925 Stearns) caused him the most trouble. “It was a case of pure ignorance,” Smith recalls wryly. “If I knew then what I know now, I never would have bought that particular car.”

It was only after a long search for a missing part and much work that he was able to completely restore the Stearns. Later he turned down $1000 for it. He rented it for use in The Lawless Years but now won’t rent it for any price. The make is now quite rare and, while Smith has heard of other Stearns sedans, he has never actually seen one. Those from our century’s “teens” period are valued from $5000 to $7000.

In The Untouchables, Federal Agent Eliot Ness (Bob Stack) uses a 1930 Buick 8 as his personal car. Actually there are two of these Buicks, both identical and both Smith’s. One Buick is used for the destructive scenes where the car gets shot up or wrecked; in one show it was partially burned.

Destructive Scenes Cause plenty of headaches for both Desilu and Smith. They get sacks of mail from angry fans when one of the elderly machines is consumed in a wreck or a fire—the blazing kind or by weapons of the early 1930s.

The wrecks and fires are all real— nothing is faked. If the car is to be totally destroyed, the studio buys it from Smith beforehand. And, naturally, they don’t destroy any of the rare vehicles. “They couldn’t afford to,” Smith grins. “It would cost a lot of money to keep wrecking cars worth four or five thousand dollars.”

When a car is only partially wrecked or burned, Smith is paid for the total damage and he restores it for further use.

Producers of The Untouchables are constantly amazed at the closeness with which its fans watch the show. During one show, some stock footage was used to show a street scene. The film had been checked thoroughly to see that it fits the proper time period. But 2200 letters received the following week disclosed that each viewer writing had spotted the 1941 Pontiac in the 1931 scene.

Death Car for Schultz. Smith has one car, a 1928 Cadillac, that he calls his Dutch Schultz car. Three times by three different studios this vehicle has served as the death car for the Dutchman.

TV commercials offer another source of steady income for Smith. Many of the filmed advertisements require cars of a certain vintage and model. Smith always has four or five of his ancient buggies on loan at the studios that specialize in these short films.

The rental fee per car varies, depending on the vehicle involved, from $30 to $100 a day, with the price increasing with the age and rarity of the vehicle. Most requests are for cars of a particular model and year. Even with 65 on hand, Smith doesn’t have everything the studios want. If he has time, he’ll get the car and restore it, provided enough rental is assured to make it profitable.

“One thing is sure,” Smith says happily. “As long as they make motion pictures and TV films, they’re going to have to have cars of the right age to fit their time requirements. It looks like I’ve got a pretty good hobby.”

Do you think anyone considers a woman’s shorter reach when designing GM instrument panels?
Fisher Body does.

That’s why you see GM Stylist Joan Gatewood establishing 35 important reference points for instrument panels on the special unit pictured above. Then she tries them out on at least 25 different-sized people to make sure even the smallest drivers can reach all the essential controls from windshield wiper activators to defroster buttons.

As a professional stylist, Joan knows how important human dimensions are to her designs. What’s more, because she’s a woman, she pays particular attention to such things as control knobs that are shaped to accommodate longer fingernails. And, knowing how confining bulky suits and tight-waisted dresses can be, she concentrates on designing instrument panels that practically hand you every control and switch, no matter what you’re wearing!

Joan’s skillful woman’s touches are important reasons why so much of the buy is in the body. And Body by Fisher makes GM cars a better buy. Chevrolet, Pontiac, Oldsmobile, Buick, Cadillac.

Body by Fisher
General Motors Symbol of Quality

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NEW PRODUCTS AND INVENTIONS

Hume workshop hobbyists who own drill presses will find the new auxiliary work table shown at right extremely useful. The top is made of heavy gauge steel permanently bonded to a plywood base. Fits any type drill press. Comes complete with anchor studs, threaded bushings, irregular shaping pin and special pivoting fence with wing nut clamp. Provides a large, flat working surface for all operations.

The new type slip-stream deflectors above are said to keep the car’s windshield clear of all foreign substances. Fastened in front of the windshield, they turn the airstream and dirt aside.

A two-faced clock for desks, tables and between twin beds is the latest thing.

The garbage and waste disposal problem can now be solved by every home owner with the aid of the gadget pictured at right. This unit can be installed in any type of sink and will pulverize waste matter before flushing it down the drain.

Although the gas shortage is apparently over, the price of gasoline remains high, and motorists will want to drive as economically as possible this winter. Those contemplating a new car will be interested in the new light sedan just placed on the market, and illustrated at left. Consuming two-thirds less gasoline than the average small car, it delivers up to 50 miles per gallon of gas. The body of the car is all steel, with a steel “turret top.” It has ample leg-room, and rides very comfortably. The model stretched out alongside gives an idea of the car’s size.

Service stations may soon take on an additional duty with the introduction of a newly patented flying automobile. The novel vehicle is primarily intended for land travel and has the appearance of a conventional car, but it is adapted to function as an airplane with a minimum of additional equipment which can be attached by a service station attendant. So far as possible the standard power and control elements of the automobile are adapted for use with the vehicle in flight. The flight surfaces are designed to be added as a unit, so that the owner of the motor car may drive up to a flight service center, attach the flying unit to his car, take off and fly to another landing field where the flying unit may be detached and used on another automobile. One important application of the invention is said to be in military operations for transporting troops by air and by ground. This would increase the mobility of mechanized units.

Bathing beauties have a new accessory to add charm with the introduction of a novel type of bathing cap. Instead of the old flat and smooth type of cap used heretofore, a woman may now wear a cap to which is attached a wig in the form of a well dressed head of hair. The wig is of molded rubber and is not affected by water. An inner head holding portion serves to maintain the cap on the head. The inner part and the outer part form a closed space which can be inflated with air to fill out the shape of the wig.

A double function barber’s apron serves not only to catch falling hair, but also to protect the clothes of the customer while being given a shampoo. The apron is in the form of a circular doughnut shaped ring and is made of oil silk to render it water-proof. Being washable, it may be kept clean and sanitary.

A new bird-shaped exerciser is claimed to be valuable for strengthening the muscles of the arms, legs, chest and back. The device includes a series of feathering wing sections attached to arm-holding units. When the wings are swung upwardly the sections are open; while the feathers close with the downward motion to give a maximum of lift. The wing motion gives a sense of buoyance and tends to develop a personal sense of poise and balance according to the inventor. This function is stated to be of value in the training of aviators.

Persons who must use a telephone and use both hands at the same time may find a new telephone support of interest. The support is shaped to hold the telephone on the shoulder by pressure from the side of the head. The holder is made of sponge rubber, soft rubber, or felt. A roughened shoulder holding part assists in preventing slipping.

-Morton Leese.

Patents Identified Automobile ……………………………………….No. 2,241,577
Bathing Cap ……………………………………..No. 2,242,420
Apron ………………………………………………..No. 2,243,505
Exerciser …………………………………………..No. 2,244,444 Support………………………………………………No. 2,243,554

Lots of Wheels With VW Push

WITH 16 of its 20 wheels powered, the 2200-lb. Nobel-Amphibil travels quickly over ditches, rocks, mud, snow, or ice— through clinging undergrowth, swamps, and swift streams, according to York Nobel Group, Ltd., London, which holds world production and sales rights.

The twin front wheels on each side are un-powered; they absorb road shocks and help guide the vehicle on steep slopes. The prototype Amphibil shown here, during tests in Norway, averaged close to 40 mpg. It’s driven by an air-cooled Volkswagen engine at up to 40 mph. The one-piece fiber glass body will hold six passengers or four passengers and about 440 lbs. of luggage. Wholesale factory price is expected to be $2,250.

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100 Million Road Maps Can’t Be Wrong

By Irv Leiberman

IN Vancouver, Washington, a quavering feminine voice inquired over the telephone if the tourist bureau of a large oil company provided a service for absolutely any emergency. “Yes,” replied the unsuspecting clerk.

“Well, I’m parked right around the corner from your office,” the woman said, “and there’s a mouse in the driver’s seat. And I won’t leave for New York until he goes away!”

Although this is not a typical question, routers in tourist services frequently are confronted with such out-of-the-ordinary requests. This is in addition to thousands of demands for regular travel information which pour in to them through the mails. And they distribute more than 100 million road maps to Americans on the go.

The questions asked by patrons cover a surprising range. The aunt of a child with rheumatic fever, taking her to the Southwest on a physician’s advice, asked about the climate and the relative merits of the public schools in that area.

A lad from a small town in North Carolina came in hoping for assistance in finding a girl he had known back home.

A Louisville bureau recently had the delicate problem of a man headed for a good job in Boston, who had stopped off on his way, spent all his money and gotten drunk. He had wired ahead for cash, but was afraid that if he wasn’t sober by the time the money came, he would go back to a bar and the job would be lost. So, the touring-service personnel doled out petty cash to him all day—first a quarter at a time for tapering-off drinks, then nickels for the successive-cups-of-coffee stage, and finally the price of a square meal when he could stand the idea of food. When his funds arrived, he was sober and fully capable of driving.

Within a week, he sent the touring service attendants a check for the money advanced and a letter of warm thanks.

A few years ago, a man driving from Washington to the West Coast stopped at the capitol’s biggest tourist bureau and asked the clerk to direct him to some Western city where he could find work. He was in bad health and wished to find a climate that would benefit him. The clerk gave him the address of a friend in Los Angeles, provided him with a card of introduction and a map. The man found work through the friend, remained there a year and improved so much that he returned to Washington. Three years have now passed but the clerk still receives friendly little notes from the grateful man.

Most questions are comparatively easy for the travel counselors, but every now and then someone comes up with a tough ‘one. For example, a Columbus, Ohio, father was going through an animal picture book with his young son—making noises like pigs, cows, roosters, dogs and cats. He was even doing pretty well with the trumpeting elephant, the roaring lion and the howling wolf. But finally he was stumped—the camel!

The father, who was a traveling salesman and had frequently received routing assistance from the tourist bureau, took a chance. He called their number.

It just so happened that one member of the staff once had heard a camel make a noise. So she cleared her throat, took several practice croaks, and calmly made like a camel on the telephone.

Here are some topical problems which came up recently at a metropolitan touring service: a clothing salesman wanted a route including every town of 10,000 population from Pennsylvania to Florida; a trailerite asked for a route touching every one of the 48 states; a Congressman on the Military Appropriations Committee requested a 12,000-mile tour covering the nation’s dams; a father who was going to assist his daughter in selecting a future Alma Mater asked for a trip through the college towns of four surrounding states; a teacher of history who was after the realistic touch wanted a motor itinerary following as closely as possible the course of the Old Tremont overland wagon trail.

Training, experience and constant reference to current road data enable the touring-service staffs of the big oil companies to mark most of the requested routes with an ease and speed that often amuses customers, especially since routers do it with the map upside down, facing customer.

While people always seem to go South in the winter and North in the summer, about 15 per cent of all inquiries concern travel to the West. Any unusual regional attraction causes a sudden increase in inquiries—fiestas, fairs, the Mardi Gras, the Kentucky Derby, the races at Indianapolis, dress parades at West Point, the Natchez Spring Pilgrimage are all magnets for the American traveler.

Diplomacy and tact are necessary qualities for an attendant at touring services. After Uncle Sidney has told a motorist about the fine route he used two years ago, it is not easy to persuade him to use another which the routers know is superior in every way. Prodigious patience is re- quired to suggest an outline for a two-week trip for four ladies, when each has a different idea of what she wants to see.

No maps prepared in advance, however, can anticipate all the personal problems involved in taking a trip by car. The travel counselor, for example, is occasionally an unwilling bystander to a family spat, and must steer a wary course to avoid entanglement when Mr. and Mrs. Jones disagree on the way they are going to drive home.

Although most of the patrons are men, routers firmly believe that the women wear the pants when travel plans are decided. If a couple calls, the feminine half usually has the final word.

All types of cars from Model T jalopies to custom-bodied foreign jobs pull up before the doors of the nation’s tourist bureaus. And the procession of human types is just as varied. When a cold snap hit New York last year and reports of frozen motors were common, a mild-mannered traveler worked his way up to a router’s desk and asked for some hot water.

“There’s plenty of water in the washroom,” the girl said, “but I’m not certain where there’s a bucket to carry it out to your car.”

“Oh, that’s all right, Miss,” he grinned. Then, pulling a bottle of milk from his jacket, “I just want to heat the baby’s formula.”

But the most amazing request to hit any touring service arrived by U. S. mail recently. It was a letter from a couple of potential honeymooners.

“We want details on a 2500-mile trip to almost anywhere,” they wrote. “Destination is no object, just as long as you make sure we never get there!”

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Why Don’t We Build… FLOATING AIRPORTS

Then when the inevitable crash occurs, it will be on open water and not a crowded city such as Elizabeth, N. J.

By Frank Tinsley

THE modern four-motored air transport is a flying fire bomb. It takes off with about 5,000 gallons of high test gasoline with the explosion potential of T.N.T. In 90 per cent of all crashes, this liquid dynamite either goes off with disintegrating force or is showered over a wide area in a flaming rain that sets fire to everything it touches. That this can be a deadly menace to people living around air- ports is shown in recent statistics. The Greater New York area alone has suffered five such crack-ups in a period of four months.

Through all the loud shouting about these crashes, it is interesting to note that neither the airport critics nor the airline defenders have come up with one obvious solution. Like New York, most of our great urban centers are adjacent to or surrounded by large bodies of open water. Throughout the United States bays, sounds, lakes and rivers provide a simple and relatively inexpensive answer to the problem. Floating airstrips!

•Does the idea sound ridiculous? It did when first proposed to the Allied Council prior to the Normandy invasion, but the brass was in no position to scoff at anything. Too many “screwy” ideas had already paid off. There were the British schoolboy’s ”degaussing cable” which countered the menace of the Nazi magnetic mine, and balloon-like rubber rafts that had saved many a pilot’s bacon. Who dared to say that the notion of forming flight strips, docks and harbor facilities of interlocking, water-tight tanks might not work?

Work it did! “Operation Lily,” a test seadrome 520 feet long and 60 feet wide, was given a tryout in 1945 at Lamlash, Firth of Clyde. It was formed of six-sided, steel buoyancy cans, each six feet in diameter and 30 inches deep. Naval Swordfish planes, weighing 9,000 pounds, used them without trouble. Anchored in otherwise unusable shallow water, the airstrip was kept headed into the wind by powerful motors and it was a complete success.

Now, Ronald M. Hamilton, Lily’s English designer, proposes a modernization of the plan to provide safe, floating airports for American cities. M.I.’s visualization of one is shown in the accompanying illustrations. Shaped like an arrow always pointed into the wind, the strip consists of a rigid, two-story structure supported by a flotation base of individually mounted watertight tanks.

The main structure resembles an elongated aircraft carrier with an open flight deck above and an enclosed hangar deck below. In the ends of the latter are repair and storage space for planes. Each two-plane compartment is separated from the next by an elevator shaft. Workshops and service facilities are spotted in projecting arrowhead islands along the entire length of the hangar deck.

The islands also contain sub-surface engine rooms in which powerful diesels are mounted to drive water propellers. These operate automatically to keep the airstrip headed into the wind and are governed by a master wind-vane on the forward deck. The incoming plane touches down just inside the after end of the flight deck and is halted by arrestor gear at the first island. A deck handling tractor then couples to the nose-wheel gear and tows the plane to the “down” elevator. Painted tracks on this portion of the deck help keep it in alignment.

Descending to the hangar deck, the plane is towed off the elevator and forward into the “depot” area. Here, completely under cover, the passengers deplane or emplane and the ship is serviced. It is then towed forward to the “up” elevator and ascends to the flight deck again. The tractor then tows it clear of the elevator and the plane’s undercarriage is engaged to the catapult traveler. A variation of the new British steam catapult accelerates slowly and smoothly and whips the plane into the air for the next leg of its flight.

Adjoining the depot area in a large central island are the passenger accommodations. If the traveler wishes to. go directly ashore, he is directed to a door on his right. This leads through a thwartship passage to the taxi waiting room, customs shed, etc. Fast water taxis are tied up to an open boat landing. In another section, helicopter taxis load in a pair of elevator shafts and are then whisked to the flight deck above to take off for various points in the city. Should the traveler find it necessary to wait for another plane, he turns to his left. Here he finds a spacious and comfortable lounge, flanked by an information booth, airline offices, newsstands, etc.

A city like New York could anchor a whole string of these airports in nearby Long Island Sound, the Lower Bay or even in the Hudson River where landing approaches and take-offs could be made over uninhabited stretches of water. Accessibility would be at least as good as that of the present airports and with helicopter taxi service, it would be better. Most of the other great centers of our country are similarly situated. Why don’t we build floating airports to make air travel safer and save our cities? •

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IT’S NEW!

SWAMP WAGON’S nine-ft. tall rear wheels have hickory treads steel-clamped to 28 in. rims weighing 700 lbs. Vehicle is designed to clamber over Florida’s soft muck bogs.

TOTCYCLIST Brad Bradley drives cut-down 125 cc Harley Davidson like a pro. Five-year-old was taught to ride 50-mph machine by his Dad. Brad began career at 18 months.

MANY-LENSED Italian Summa camera has revolving turret housing regular lens, wide angle lens and two for direct sighting. It also has hand grips and flash attachments.

NO FANCY PANTS, Solly Davis holds Geiger counter inside Goodyear’s new one-piece vinyl film anti-radiation suit Inflated by compressed air, suit is air-conditioned.

BLOW-UP house can be inflated by a man in three minutes. British rubber hut is nine ft high with floor space of 30×19 ft. It has all comforts of home—phone, lights.

SINKPROOF claims Danish inventor Clous Sorensen of his novel lifeboat which has its rudder and screw hidden in tube. Mate is strapped in seat under plastic hood.

DIRECTOMAT in Times Square, N.Y., issues a card with directions to get to any station in subway system when destination button is pushed. Great aid for out-of-towners.

SUPER SOFT Terra-Tires allow this plane to taxi at high speed over scattered 2×4 blocks. Goodyear is testing them for use by aircraft on rough ground cluttered with obstacles.

MOTO-VAC sucks up dirt in car when attached to exhaust pipe and engine is started. Nobby British invention comes with 12 ft. hose, operates by exhaust jet extraction.

TINY TV camera developed by Lockheed will give engineers ringside seat when studying the performance of control surfaces on new aircraft during flight operations.

FLASHLIGHT is latest Russian all-weather jet fighter. Sleek craft is swept-wing, twin jet, dual-placed job which gives the appearance of being effective interceptor.

RED TV antennas bristle atop these wooden shacks in the suburbs of Moscow. Soviet citizens like video and many houses that have no running water boast a TV set.

Flying Saucer is for advertising purposes only. Walter Galonska, left, of Germany, spent a year building it. Since free-flying machines are verboten to Germans, Galonska anchors it with a steel cable. An electric motor drives the two contra-rotating propellers. Here he shows it to Dr. Ursinus, glider plane experimenter.

ONE-WHEEL TRUCK
TRAILMOBILE, Inc., the nation’s second largest trailer builders, recently found plans of what may have been the granddaddy of all trailer-tractors—the “motor wheel” shown in the accompanying pictures. Manufactured more than 60 years ago by an outfit bravely styled the International Motor Wheel Co., it was invented by one J.W. Walters. The unit consisted of a rubber-tired wooden wheel propelled by a two-cylinder, air-cooled gasoline motor mounted with a heavy flywheel on one side of the fork; on the other side were twin gas tanks. The steering wheel turned the whole unit; to reverse, you turned it right around. Or you would have, if you’d had the chance to drive it. Few ever did. The idea of a petrol-eating horse for a wagon was great, but the motor of the period wasn’t.