A short circuit beyond the lighting switch will not show on the meter until switch is turned to circuit in which short circuit is located. This will cause lights to dim and show a heavy discharge on meter.
As there are other circuits whose current does not pass through meter, a short circuit in them would not be indicated on meter, but would be indicated by running down of battery. To locate, remove all bulbs, also all wires from one of the battery terminals. Connect one side of the trouble lamp to battery terminal and the other side of lamp to wires removed. Any current leaving the battery must now pass through the trouble lamp causing it to light.
1—If trouble lamp lights when lighting switch is turned off, short circuit is either in starting motor-circuit, generator circuit (or cut-out does not open), horn circuit, or in wires between lighting switch and battery, or in ignition circuit. Eliminate one circuit after another until trouble lamp goes out. Then examine circuit on which it goes out for short.
2—If trouble lamp lights only when lighting switch is on, short circuit is in circuit beyond lighting switch. Examine circuit indicated on face of switch when in position that trouble lamp lights, as switch can be divided into sections. Eliminate one section after another until trouble lamp goes out; then examine this circuit for short.
CHAPTER XLVIII
THE GOLDEN RULE OF MOTORING
This volume does not pretend to set a standard of manners for owners of automobiles, nor does it profess to be a first-aid course in courtesy, much less suggest lessons in gentlemanliness, which might as well be called gentleness at once; yet there is sad need of instruction in all these things, if one may judge by the experiences of the road and of the inn and garage stops along the way.
Now the writer believes that the American citizen is a gentleman to the manor born, of natural right and disposition, and that he does not leave his manners at home, as he is supposed to leave his religion at the church door. A gentleman in the drawing-room will be a gentleman on the highway. He will not be a boor because the man he happens to meet is one, not even if the majority are.
Why is it, then, that there is an utter absence of courtesy, or if there be an occasional display of good nature it but emphasizes the lack of it in general? Undoubtedly this is a fair statement of conditions in and about the metropolis. It is not true to anywhere near the same extent in the Western country, and “Western” ought to be understood in this connection as anything west of the Alleghany range.
The writer has been astounded on several occasions in Denver and other Western cities at the really human spirit of the drivers. They actually stopped of their own accord to let the writer, a pedestrian at the time, cross the street, and did it in so gracious a way as to make it seem a real pleasure. Picture that on Fifth Avenue, New York City, or upon any of the highways out of the metropolis on a Sunday or holiday in warm weather.
But it is not alone in the attitude of the driver toward the pedestrian that there is remissness, but in the behavior toward other drivers that there is need for improvement. What is easier than to cheerfully make way for the man who wishes to pass by, or to turn aside as much as may be necessary for the other car we meet; to slow up at the intersection, instead of spurting to get ahead of the other fellow, and making him jam on the brakes to avoid a collision? Why is it necessary to try to get the best of the other fellow, as though driving were a contest of wits and that skill on the road consisted in “beating the other fellow to it?”