The Washington herald., 1919-06-29
OWNERS SERVICE
DEPARTMENT.

Q. had some trouble on the road
not long ago. II was like this: The
Notor wouldn't run only slowly and
then II wouldn't pull at all. i had II
towed into the garage and there
tested it for everything and conclud-
ed that the spark was at fault I had
a repairman come in from the service
station and he worked around 1t for
a number of hours and i found out
that the generator chain was broken.
Now. how could this stop the motor
from running?
A. 1t is easy to see that if the gen
orator feeds the load after a certain
speed is reached. the engine would
not run at or above that speed if the
generator driving chain were broken.
The battery feeding at low speeds
accounts for the fact that the engine
would idle all right.
Q. Can old oil taken from the crank
case and other places be used over
again after filtering off the solid mat
ter? Where is the Stanley steamer
factory? What other steamers are
made?
engine fabrication. After removing
leaf fabrication and for brake con-
nection and similar places.
= The Stanley is made in Newton,
Mass. The Doble Is another steam
car. made by the General Engineer
ing Company, Detroit. Mich.
O. What is the meaning of truck
tractor; also what is an industrial
truck? When a car is converted into
a truck and the load is given as 3.0cc
pounds. is that the maximum load OF
the safe load?
4. A truck tractor is a vehicle which
carries load and also pulls one. An
Industrial truck is small vehicle
used for carrying goods indoors or
for short distance outdoors as for ex-
ample trunk and baggage carriers as
used at railroad stations. IndustriaIs
are usually operated by storage bat
teries.
That depends on the maker. Often
the maximum load is given and again
the safe load. Better ask.
Q. Why hasn't the electric car made
any headway? There are so many ad-
vantages to it that all / can see
against il is the speed
\. Aside from its performance being
much below that OF a gosofine car. the
electric has = limited range of opera
tion, since battery change gives only
definite amount of mileage. As one
engineer said. the driver of an cleo
trio Is obvious that every minute he
has less current than the minute be-
fore The electric is highly efficient
vehicle and well suited to certain work
in cities. 1t fills a definite need in the
commercial field and is coming in in
greater number there.
.. I am charging 20 cents an hour
for work and frankly / don't know
whether I am making money on the
shop My men are getting more and 1
think / would be justified in raising to
90 cents IL the customers would stand
for it. How about rates in other ci-
ties. have they gone I'D at all?
A. You would be justified in rails
ing your rates with the men getting
higher wages and everything con-
nected with repairing costing more,
but why not find out how much you
are making now? Get hold of good
cost system or pay an accountant for
a few days work to go over your
>naks and tell you where you stand.
20 not work In the dark. Half the
shops in the country run along with
cut knowing how much they make,
when II Is a comparatively easy mat
ter to find out. Write TO the editor
OF the trade paper you use for a cost
system and II you cannot get it we
VIII send you one.