Evening Star Newspaper, May 31, 1925, Page 67

‘ / THE CARBON MONOXICE [ THE SUNDAY MOTORIST AS PUBLIC HAZARD One of the Problems Being Studied by Bureau of Mines Experts. Elimination of carbon monoxide a public hazard is one of the prob- lems being studied by experts of the Bureau of Mines. The most danger- ©ous phase of the problem, however, is Presented in tunnels rather than on surface roads. In a paper prepared for the Amer. an_Chemical Soclety, S. H. Katz of the Bureau of Mines points out that carbon monoxide taken into the lungs in quantities of one part to 10,000 parts of air—and endured from three 10 #ix hours daily—is virtually harm- less, while four parts of this gas in 10,000 parts of air for exposures ex- ceeding one hour, or greater concen. trations for shorter periods, may cause sickness, unconsciousness or even death. Gives Rise to New Problems. Carbon monoxide evolved in the ex- haust from automobiles, says Mr. Katz, has given rise to new problems in ventilation engineering. About 10,000 cuble feét of pure afr, he says, may be required to dilute the exhaust from an automobile to entirely harm- less proportions. This amount of dilution may be deécreased, however, as the time pf exposure of persons to the gas mix- ture is reduced. Large garages, where automobiles come and ve a problem, he says, in monoxide, which affects the worker: and provision must be made for removing the gas by special ystems. test problems,” contin- “are those of ventilat- ing tunnels for vehicular traffic, such under the Hudson River between New York City and Jersey City and the tunnels under the South Hilis at Pittsburgh, Pa “Both tunnels consist of twin tubes, one for traffic in each direction. Ex- tensive research und engineering skill desigri have evolved systems of ven- tilation to frotect the public under the conditions of dense automobile traffic, and any other circumstances.” Hudson Tunnels to be Ventflated. THe tunnels under the Hudson River, according to Mr. Katz, are to be ventilated by a transverse passage of air. Fresh air will enter at the sides near the floor and emerge at the center of the roof. Specially con structed ducts below the floor dis- tribute the air to all parts of the tun- nel, and a duct above the roof re- moves the impure air. Another system, he points out, has been designed for the tunnels at Pittsburgh, and a - series of eight motor-driven fans installed to exhaust the impure air, making the tunnels entirely safe against carbon monox- ide_poisoning. The large number of deaths re- ported from carbon monoxide poison- ing according to this expert, are from 2as stoves rather than automobile exbausts. LEARN NAMES OF PARTS. Enowledge May Save Car Owner Annoying Delays. A man can drive an automobile and get along reasonably ‘well without knowing one part from another, but no one can say with assurance that Lis attitude of mind will be any insur- ance against having the car tied up over the week end. There may come a time when an important part may give way and when the local dealer may not have it in stock. There may come a time when the local dealer {8 not avaliable. When this happens it is rather handy to know the exact name of the part, so that you can wire 1o the next nearest agency or distribu- tor for a new one..-It may mean com- ing to some Saturday night with the car ready for a full Sunday's wofk, instead of witnessing it waiting at the service station USED CAR AUTO TbPIC. Raphael Semmes to Speak at Trade Association Meeting. Raphael Semmes Mo pal speaker the Washington president of the . will be the prinet onthly meeting of Automotive Trade Association tomorrow night at the b. Mr. Semmes will discuss car problem and its relation utomobile business ers pertaining to the au- de in Washington will which will Paul B. Lum, BENT VALVE STEMS. Give Under Pressure When Tappet | Clearance Is Too Slight. Every now and again the average motor will develop a bent valve stem, and the owner who knows that valves ride in close fitting guides naturally wonders how it comes about. Service have found the answer in too much eagerness for quiet engin: Valve tappet clearances, if too slight, mean that after valve stem expansion the valves will be held slightly open Here, then, is the valve tappet hold- Ive so that it can go so far -, while up top (or dewn depending upon whether one is speak of a valve-in-head or L- head motor) the fired gas mixture is orcing the valve head down as far as it will go. Something has to give, and its usually the valve stem which bends a little to ease the shock. Soak Chamois in Water. 4 mew chamois should be soaked in water for a4 day or two in order to re- move the dressing. This also will pre- vent it from leaving lint on the car. Qalifornia has the greatest pas- senger car density per papulation, approximately 3 cars to every 10 persons. B i L S RN— ANNOUNCING OUR REMOVAL TO OUR NEW HOME 1811-13-15-17 FOURTEENTH STREET CREEL BROS. Automobile Electricians. Distributor and Official Service For Flat Lite, Delco, Remy, Eisemann, Basco, Atwater Kent, Robert Bosch, Stromberg Carburetor, Stromberg Shock Absorber., An Abridged Magazine for Car Owners EDITED BY WILLIAM ULLMAN One drink less is & good remedy for front wheel wabble. Will It Come to This? 1f it has been demonstrated that the Harrison anti-drug act has created the drug peddler and that the Vol- stead act is responsible for the bootleg- ger is it natural for the motorist to wonder what harm has been done by reason of the Dyer act, assuming that comparisons are enlightening and not odious. The Dyer act provides for heavy pealties to be imposed upon persons convicted of transporting stolen cars from one State to another. It aims to break up the theft game by in- timidating both the thief and the man who encourages car thievery by buy- ing_questionable used cars. It aims to break up the moral weakness of yielding to the temptation of buying stolen cars cheaply, just as the Har- rison act eims to put an end to the dope habit and as the Volstead act aims to dry up the Nation. Both the Harrison and Volstead acte have been ripped up the back, and the question arises whether the Dyer act is in the same category. The Nation has been handicapped through lack of adequate publicity for the operations of this law. for the reason that the reformers have been too busy with the dope peddlers and bootleg- gers to give much attention to the stolen car situation. Perhaps that ex- plains why the counterfeiting of license plates has come upon motor- dom with such a jolt. It the Harrison act has been the inspiration for the evil work of the dope peddler surely the Dyer act must be encouraging some equally nefarious development. The whole automobile theft game is much more secretly con- ducted than dope peddling or bootleg- ging, and that is one reason why many believe that the Nation will awaken suddenly to the fact that the mere stealing of cars has broadened into a moral weakening in car ownership. These people fear that the Nation will discover thousands of motorists who are willing to forge certificates of title, use counterfeit license plates, dabbie in stolen cars and, in short, follow the trend that has made possible “snow parties” and the hip flask. Some Good Ideas Here. In one city they are building apart- mexau with garages under the court- yard. Bridgeport, Conn,, is one of the few cities that boasts a street intersection where no turns of any kind are per- mitted. This helps to keep drivers away from congested points which they do not really need to use. Pennsylvania is bullding permanent white lines at curves, but not on the straightaway. Traffic, it is claimed, is unnecessarily retarded with too many white lines. Replacing the Highways. While the automotive industry rap- idly approaches the point where re- placement of cars in service becomes the basis of an annual guarantee of business, motordom approaches with apprehension the day when the an- nual replacement of highways worn out by motor vehicles will preclude the possibllity of extending the mile- age of paved roads in America Connecticut is said to be spending about $3,000,000 on highway main tenance, making the outlook for new highway projects extremely doubtful for the current year. At the present time, the highway commissioner says, there are 206 miles of highway in this State that should be rebuilt and that all the department can hope to accomplish this year in this connec- tion is to repair 100 miles of it. Prior to July 1, 1923, the State of Nebraska had completed 475.86 miles of Federal-ald roads. Since that date approximately 1,700 miles of Federal- aid roads have either been completed or put through varying stages of con- struction. Altogether there are over 5,600 miles of Federal-aid highways in Nebraska out of a total of over 80,000 miles of State roads. If it is going to cost Connecticut $3,000,000 to maintain approximately 12,000 miles of roads this year—only $250 a mile—Nebraska is typical of the larger States that may soon be bur- dened by the maintenance problem. To outwit the menace of highway depreciation it may Soon cost Ne- braska $20,000,000 annually. Ohio, New York, Georgia, Wisconsin, Mich- igan and Pennsyivania may each have to spend as much. Minnesota, Iowa, Oklahoma and Tllinois may find an annual burden of $25,000,000 fac- ing them. In other words, the entire amount paid to the motor vehicle de- partments of all the States in 1924— $225,000,000, excluding $65,000,000 in gas taxes which are not all applicable to roadbuilding—would not pay for the annual highway maintenance of the States mentioned above. Now You Have It. (Answers to last week's questions.) 1. “Unsprung weight” is any part of an automobile that does not benefit from the shock-absorbing qualities of the springs, such as the wheels, the axles, the differential, part of the pro- pellor shaft and the steering assem- bly below the steering gear. Pennsylvania paid the largest amount of motor vehicle fees in 1924, $31,196,917, to be exact. 3. Improper parking, in one city at least, was a direct cause of 12 ac- cidents last year. 4. Springs are often made stiffer on the left side of the car in order to compensate for the constant weight of the driver who occuples a place on the left side of the car. 5. A device known as a ‘“circut breaker” takes the place of fuses in the electrical systems of a number of cars. When there is a short circuit somewhere in the system the circuit is interrupted and will not close again until the “short” is eliminated. Shift Out of This. Is it any wonder that 20,000 galions | of gasoline are being consumed in the United States every minute? Al most every driver makes a triple de- mand upon the contents of his gas tank whenever he shifts through the gears. The right way to shift through the gears is to accelerate a little just before shifting to the higher gear. Reversing this process, however, mil- lions of drivers allow the car to slow down between gear changes, thus making it necessary to give the en- glne a lot of gas in order to overcome the dragging action of the car. The only purpose of shifting through the gears is to allow the engine to get the car in motion with a minimum of effort on the part of the engine, but too many drivers seem to think that the gears are a matter of formality. After they have shifted through to high gear the car is still rolling so slowly that the engine is under great strain to make the car pick up. Strain is always evidence of waste. On the Ragged Edge. Discovery by the United States De- partment of Agriculture that drivers keep to the crown of the road because Comne in and Talk It Over Semmes Motor Co. “We Paint While Y~u Ride” 613617 G St. N.W. Automobile value can only be truly judged by things that are not apparent in the casual inspection of the car, The chassis, the engine, the springs, all the mechanical parts of the car, have a most important bearing on its value, yet many buyers seem to take the mechanical soundness of a car for granted and allow their choice to be influenced by unimpor- tant details. Stanley H. Horner Retail Dealer 1015 14th St. Main 5296 “Convenient to Downtown.” SUNDAY STAR, WASHINGTO Half the Families In U. S. Now Own At Least One Car Every other family in the United States owns an automobile, accord- ing to Alfred Reeves, general man- ager of the National Automobile Chamber of Commerce. Of the 17,500,000 motor vehicles registered {n the country, 2,100,000 are ‘trucks, and approximately 1,000,000 cars are owned by busi- ness concerns. Twelve families out of every 1,000, Mr. Reeves est mates, own more than one car, leaving around 14,000,000 passenger cars_for the 27,000,000 families in the United States. they are afraid of the unsafe edges may open the eyes of motordom to the fact that thousands of miles of highways are on the ragged edge be- cause the shoulders are neglected. It appears to be the policy of some high- way departments to post warnings to the effect that shoulders are incom- plete, and then start another road before making a thorough job of the first one. A large number of the concrete roads have shoulders that are unsafe at speeds of over 15 miles an hour, even in dry weather. Patched roads, of which there are many thousands of miles in ail parts of the country, are 80 uneven along the edges that the careful driver has to leave an ex- cessive margin of safety for good measure. The puddles created by uneven shoulders during rain storms have been frequent causes of water-logging brakes to a point where their eficiency is dangerously lowered. Did You Know— That spark plugs should not be cleaned until after the engine has warmed up? Cleaning them when the engine is stone cold means sac rificing Some of the resuits due to the drenching they will get with raw gasoline during the starting proces That crude ofl rubbed on the worn top of the car will not only brighten it up but keep it from allowing water to soak through and mark the inside? That it the ammeter registers dis charge after the engine has stopped and the lights have been switched off, the cut-out, or relay, is not work ing properly and the battery is dis. charging back into the generator? D. C, MAY 31 1925-PART 3 John Smith and His Car BY FREDERICK C. RUSSELL. John Smith is a character whom every motorist should welcome. He is not selfish; rather he is a motoring martyr, a chap willing and glad to have exploited, in an interesting way, his experiences for the benefit of the other 10,000,000 or more membe: No. 100—The Timing Gears. Nothing 18 so interesting to Smith as to discover some unit of the car which he has not noticed before. This time the discovery concerned a set of gears at the forward end of the engine.’ While these gears were completely Incased, the shape of the housing was an excellent clue as to their size and position. Smith could see that by re- moving a number of cap screws the tront halves of casings could be re- moved, thus exposing the gears. But be was content to view the unit in X-ray fashion, for as yet he hadn’t any ideaas to its function. One purpose of the gears was evi- dent, however. They were driving an exposed countershaft which, in turn, operated the water pump and gener- ator: but apparently they had some more vital function. By visualizing the centers of the various gears he found that the shaft which two of them operated was located in the crankcase. Two shafts in the crank- case? He was indeed puzzled Smith Visits Mechanic. Here Smith followed a course of action which has proved helpful to him on many occasions. Whenever he wants to learn anything about the car, but hesitates to reveal his igno- rance, he goes to his favorite me- chanic on some pretext, and invari- ably finds out what he wants to know. “Joe,” he said, addressing the pride of the service station, “I'm a bit puz- zled about these gears. I'm wonder- ing whether 1 should remove these plates and pack the gears with grease. 1 don't see anything in the instruction book about greasing them, but I don't like to take any chances.” “You never have to grease the timing gears,” Joe replied. ‘They're ofled automatically.” Timing gears! So that's yhat they were. The game of learning without having to reveal his ignorance was progressing nicely. “But don't they need an occasional adjusting?” he ventured. “Not unless they're badly worn,” oe explained. hen a car'’s been run a long time the timing gears may eed replacing or tightening. And of ourse if you remove one of these rs of the motor clan.” gears in order to pull out the cam- shaft you must be careful to set it in thé right position when you put the shaft back agaln. Otherwise your valves will open and close at the wrong time, and the motor won't run.” Mysterious Second Shaft. The camshaft! So that was the mysterious second shaft in the crank. case. Of course a poppet valve metor must have a shaft to actuate the valve tappets and push rods, and this shaft must run parallel with the main engine shaft, though not necessarily in the crafkease. He recalled seeing one or two cars at the show with camshafts running along the top of the motor, as in airplane engines. Why hadn't he thought of all this before? Joe was explaining something else. “Motorists get rather puszied over these timing gears, but it's really a very simple matter. The manufac- turer makes it even simpler for the car owner by marking the crankshaft gear and the camshaft gear at the points where they must be matched, S0 that the motor will not be out of time. The shape of the cams of the camshaff determine the points in the engine cycle at which the valves are opened and closed, and also by the relation between the camshaft and the main shaft. If the car owner will just be careful to match the marks on the timing gears he will have noth- ing to worry about, except to do the finishing work of adjusting the valves accurately at the tappets. But you'll not have to worry about your timing gears for some time to come. Look how quietly your motor runs. When AUTO RIMS FOR ALL WHEELS Rundlett Rim Co. 1336 14th St. N.W. Germany Testing New Bullet-Proof Fluid for Tires Bullet-proof automobile tires, said to be made possible by the injection of & new puncture-proof fluid, are being tested by military and police officials in the school of transporta- tion of the Schutzpolizei, or de‘ense troops, of Germany. The fluid, called zrmourit, was first tested in army truck tires on a 60-mile course. Each tire was punctured with 7-inch nails, which were then withdrawn, and the fluid was injected. The trucks returned with the air pressure as high as at the start, it is reported. One of the tires ia #aid to have withstood three shots for an army service rifle, for, although the bul- lets punctured the rim, no air escaped. The fluld is a sort of concrete which is said to do no Injury to the rubber. It remains liquid until the ?)lghenl contact with air solidifies t. the timing gears get loose or worn you'll get a buzzing sound or even knocking.” Puzzled Again. mith was puzzled. ‘A humming sound?” he asked “I've heard the engines of several cars making such a noise lately—and they were brand new." “You'll find that frequently,” Joe explained. “It occurs when you get a set of bad gears. Sometimes they are cut poorly, or they may simply vibrate. Humming will also occur if a new gear {s meshed with an old one. DEHCO Baked Enamel On Automobiles Read About It In Our Free Booklet DEHCO PLANT 1724 Kalorama Road Columbia 7163 -more about your own car A new type of timing gear seen on some cars is made in two halves (each half being complete, but half the thickness of the original gear), with a non-metallic material inserted in be tween to absorb vibration and deaden the noise.” “That’s right,”” Smith said. “I re. member an automobile salesman teil ing me about non-metallic gears just the other day. I didn’t pay much tention because I wasn't interested in his car. “Well, shows ¥ Joe u how remarked, “that just You can learn a lot by always being in the market for a new car. It's money in your pocket.” In Smith's mind there wasn't any doubt of 1t. ? Next week — Why CompFomise. (Copsright. 1 Manufacturers Conveniently Located on Fourteenth Street Hawkins Nash Motor Co. Sales and Service 1337 14th St. Tube Repair Kit every purchase amounting to one doliar or more, exclusive of gasoline (Until June 1st, 1925) India Tires “They Keep Down the Upkeep” Easy Credit Terms Potomac Tire Co. 28th and M Sts. The Brougham 1595 Freight and Tax Extra Now On Display at 1100 Connecticut Ave. N.W. This is an entirely new type Hudson. It . hasall thesmartness of the finest custom- built body and the advantage that Hudson offers in all models—the advan- tage that large volume gives in low price. Hudson-Essex Now World’s Largest Selling 6-Cylinder Cars " Lambert-Hudson Motors Co. Salesroom Distributor Service Station 1100 Conn. Ave. N.\W. Franklin 7700 633 Mass. Ave. N.W. ASSOCIATE DEALER Neumeyer Motor Company Salesroom 1823 14th St. Service Station North 7522 | 211 B St. N.W. Frank. 7690