SPEED OF CARS.
As regards speed, motor cars can rival the fastest express trains, even on long journeys. In fact, feats performed during the Gordon-Bennett and other races have equalled railway performances over equal distances. When we come to record speeds, we find a car, specially built for the purpose, covering a mile in less than half a minute. A speed of over 120 miles an hour has actually been reached. Engines of 150 h.p. can now be packed into a vehicle scaling less than 1½ tons. Even on touring cars are often found engines developing 40 to 60 h.p., which force the car up steep hills at a pace nothing less than astonishing. In the future the motor car will revolutionize our modes of life to an extent comparable to the changes effected by the advent of the steam-engine. Even since 1896, when the "man-with-the-flag" law was abolished in the British Isles, the motor has reduced distances, opened up country districts, and generally quickened the pulses of the community in a manner which makes it hazardous to prophesy how the next generation will live.
Note.—The author is much indebted to Mr. Wilfrid J. Lineham, M. Inst. C.E., for several of the illustrations which appear in the above chapter.
[8] Steam-driven cars are not considered in this chapter, as their principle is much the same as that of the ordinary locomotive.
[9] On some cars natural circulation is used, the hot water flowing from the top of the cylinder to the tank, from which it returns, after being cooled, to the bottom of the cylinder.
[10] For explanation of the induction coil, [see p. 122]