Vol 54, No 5
Articles in this issue
- The Pierce Cycle Co. of Buffalo will include a motor bicycle in its 1907 line, using a Thor engine and carburetter, after years of refusing to "warm up" to the power-driven machine.
- Humber shares quoted at 4 shillings twelve months ago are now held at 21, taken as evidence that the British cycle trade is in better shape than supposed.
- The Duckworth Chain & Mfg. Co. of Springfield, Mass., adds a one-inch-pitch double-roller chain especially adapted to motorcycle use.
- September and nine-month British export returns show 57,291 complete bicycles worth £318,728 plus £544,487 of parts, and £38,755 of motorcycles and parts, though average bicycle value fell to £5 11s. 3d.
- J. C. Weston, long with Morgan & Wright and latterly manager of their Detroit branch, becomes the firm's general representative with the whole country as his field.
- The Hurck Cycle Co. of St. Louis incorporates as the Hurck Motor & Cycle Co. with $5,000 capital; John Hurck and Alfred J. Carpenter hold 240 shares each.
- Santa Ana, Cal.: J. A. Hankey sold a half interest to Walter Congdon, the firm restyled Hankey & Congdon.
- The Canada Cycle & Motor Co.'s annual statement reports $904,207.29 of sales and $32,405.54 profit with no dividend paid, Canadian bicycle sales up, and the Sydney, Brisbane and Adelaide branches disposed of in favour of selling agencies.
- A foreigner describes experiments with pulverised "dust fuels" against a possible gasolene famine, rejecting coal dust and alcohol in favour of lycopodium, the fine yellow moss spore powder used to make stage lightning.
- Badly placed ground-return connections in the primary circuit, not the accumulators or coil, are identified as the real cause of weak ignition sparks.
- Ventilation and an ordinary foot pump fitted with rubber washers and an old tank stopper will clear gasolene vapour from stored motorcycle tanks, answering repairmen who cannot obtain compressed air.
- Makers' failure to offer drop-frame machines is blamed for slow uptake among women; Mrs. Mary E. Kennard of England takes delivery of her sixth mount, a 3 hp machine with magneto ignition, spring forks and her own priming tube.
- The Eadie Mfg. Co. of Redditch declares profits equal to 41 per cent on ordinary capital, and the Enfield Cycle Co. reports $142,000 for the year, its best since 1898.
- A cracked spark plug porcelain lowers compression and slows the machine; the sure test is to cup a hand over the plug while running and feel the escaping hot gases.
- Editorial: a manufacturer explains that a customer who points out flaws teaches him more than a flatterer with "no baskets-full of kicks," since results breed facts and theory does not.
- Editorial urging promoters to program class races by actual performance, 1:25, 1:30, 1:35, rather than rated horsepower, citing Chairman Douglas of the F. A. M. Competition Committee, who handicapped on past form.
- Riding trains the senses unconsciously, so that a tightened ball race or a twig against the spokes is noticed at once, though one rider leapt off in alarm at a clicking that proved to be his motor echoing off roadside fence posts.
- President C. W. Nason gives a cup to the New York Motorcycle Club, to be contested twice yearly by Captain's and Lieutenant's teams of five over a 50-mile non-stop speed-judgment run, the first about Nov. 11th on a Bronx course.
- Herman H. Hintze of the Tiger Wheelmen will attack Charles Mock's 4 hours 27 minutes 100-mile motorpaced road record on November 3rd over a Valley Stream–Jericho–Springfield course, despite F. A. M. opposition to road pacing.
- Emil Leuly and Harry Early of the Century Road Club of America's New Jersey division covered 1,042 miles including six centuries in ten days from Jersey City through New England, guided in part by Massachusetts State Centurion Fred Perreault.
- Rain forced postponement of the Providence Motorcycle Club's meet on the Hillsgrove track, disappointing President Betts, Vice-President Hastings and Chairman Douglas; 23 men are entered for the 10 miles handicap alone.
- P. T. Powers slates the fourteenth annual six-day race for December 10th to 15th and names candidates including Walter Rutt, Petit Breton, the Georget brothers, Pye and Clarke, with Rutt–McFarland, Root–Fogler, Hollister–Hopper and Pye–Clark the strongest pairs.
- A. G. Batchelder resigns the presidency of the National Cycling Association; Daniel M. Adee, president of the Century Road Club Association, is to be inducted by mail vote of Chairman Kelsey's Board of Control.
- Fourteen riders scaled Perry Hill at Algonquin, Ill., in the Chicago Motorcycle Club's hill-climb: Charles Van Sickle (Indian) was fastest at 26 seconds flat, but Callendar's capacity-time-weight formula gave the cup to Charles Blankenheim (Torpedo).
- A charity's scheme for free bicycle-cleaning stations staffed by the unemployed was voted down after a waggish member moved to add the words "and baby carriages."
- A satirical one-act comedy in which would-be six-day riders Slye and Shlusser are ushered in to promoter P. T. Bowers at 220 Broadway, then shown out unpaid and swearing in the elevator lobby.
- Robert J. Walthour sails from Europe on the 18th of next month to train for the six-day race, and is generally understood to be pairing with Hugh MacLean of Boston.
- Fully a third of London's railway stations now store bicycles by the day, week or month, at charges from $1.87 a month down to eight cents a day.
- A London meeting voted 173 to 156 for the Cyclists Touring Club to drop "Cyclists" from its title and admit pedestrians, motorists, horsemen and other road users, subject to the courts.
- The Salvation Army's "Cycle Missionary Legion" at Syracuse, N.Y., uses bicycles to reach towns off the railroads; Capt. Shenkenberger of the German branch appeals for one or two more machines, second-hand included.
- The Des Moines, Iowa, police buy a motor bicycle to answer burglar alarms faster than the patrol wagon, their second machine, after a four-cylinder foreign mount bought to break up automobile scorching.
- A motorcyclist and his wife drive a spring-frame tri-car from Ambala across the unbridged Ghaggar river and up to Kasauli, 5,800 feet, the first motor vehicle of any description to reach the hill station.
- Thorwald Ellegaard won the Grand Prix de Neuilly at the Buffalo Velodrome, Paris, from Gabriel Poulain and Franseco Verri, the young Italian having beaten Emil Friol and Henri Mayer in his semi-final.
- The Crescent Bicycle Club of Baltimore held its second open half-century run under Captain T. W. Baker; thirty-one riders qualified for souvenir medals.
- Damp, chafed wiring, plugs left switched in after stopping and loose binding screws waste current that riders wrongly charge to their dry cells; an ammeter test on each cell is urged.
- Even the best acetylene headlight flattens the appearance of ruts and holes, making speed on a rutty road after dark a doubtful pastime for the motorcyclist.
- Hanging a machine from a rope or spring and tracing curves with a pencil against a moving pad records how motor speed and road bumps combine to shake the frame, illustrated by five recorded waveforms.
- Riders who never learned to ride "hands off", among them Brooklyn Motorcycle Club president E. W. Carritt, with 40,000 miles behind him, admit they need the grip to keep their balance, though the motor bicycle frees one hand.
- A survey of the theories of side-slip, tracing skidding to tire grip and road surface, the distribution of weight over the wheels, wheel base, and the vibrating thrust of the drive on the rear wheel.
- L. J. Leonard of the Century Road Club Association summons Chicago's old-timers to a reception and dance at Brooke's casino on November 6th to plan a winter six-day race on the Madison Square Garden model.
- A motorcycle tire is reckoned to do about eleven times the work of a bicycle tire, so its owner must follow the automobilist rather than the cyclist in constant inflation and prompt, thorough repair.
- Beginners are urged to shut off power well before a corner, since the motor bicycle's higher speed makes a short-radius curve far riskier than on a pedal machine.
- A clean burnable mixture, fat spark and correct lubrication save the rider the periodic dismantling otherwise needed to clear carbon from the piston head and combustion space.
- An Irish jaunting-car driver's advice to sit loose is applied to cyclists and motorcyclists who ride stiff and grip the bars "like grim death" on greasy pavements and go down at slight provocation.
- The motorcycle's much greater weight means a fall breaks pedals, cranks and gasolene or oil connections, so it should always be propped where a slight jar or bump cannot bring it down.
- A cyclist dismounted to inspect his rear tire after a sudden explosion, only to realise the report came from the silent-running motor bicycle passing in the opposite direction.