Car Fires

There is nothing the Guardianistas on the Today programme love more than a good scare story. This morning it was rising food prices and 138,000 Toyotas going on fire. Even its interviewee on the price of wheat was cautious about its effect on the cost of a loaf. Scott Brownlee did a decent job of saying Toyota’s recall concerned a window switch in danger of melting, and 138,000 Rav4s and Corollas were not about to incinerate themselves. Silly woman presenter kept claiming Toyota’s press release said there was a fire risk. It said nothing of the kind, but in her efforts to show how nasty big corporations are she exaggerated, and Toyota had to issue an amendment.

Toyota Window Switch Recall: Clarification On Media Reports Of ‘Fire Risk’ Issue Toyota has today announced a recall of 138,000 Yaris, Auris and RAV4 cars in the UK. This involves the electrical contact in the driver’s side Power Window Master Switch (PWMS), which may over time come to feel ‘notchy’ or sticky during operation.

If commercially available cleaning lubricants are applied to the switch to address the notchy or sticky feel, the switch assembly may overheat and/or melt. In the USA, issues of melting or erosion are categorised under ‘fire’ by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. If a car's power window switch feels notchy, owners should not attempt to address the issue themselves with commercially available lubricants. Toyota engineers have conducted various simulation tests, including using commercially available lubricants. In no instance did a fire result. There has been only one case related to this issue in the UK, and no reported accidents.

Trouble was, this is the second recall of door window switches in as many days, and Honda’s press release was more alarmist. Honda said it would be trying to contact everyone who owns a Swindon-made CR-V, “because of a potentially dangerous defect that could lead to it catching fire”. The problem was spotted after one owner in Britain, and four in the United States said they could smell burning. It seems to be a faulty seal on a master switch inside the driver’s door that controls the automatic windows. If liquid seeps inside, it could overheat and the door could catch fire. Are they all using the same switch? The same supplier? The same door trim manufacturer? I think we should be told.

The pictures are of a Volvo that caught fire on a Scottish road. It started as a small conflagration under the bonnet (top), but as I watched the car comprehensively destroyed itself, with much crackling and banging as windows broke and fuel ignited. Another memorable car fire I watched was when a colleague in the Glasgow motor trade was trying to sell a VW Beetle (old air-cooled sort) to an overweight Glasgow lady. She thought she would try the back seat but was so heavy that when she sat down the batteries underneath shorted out through the seat springs. The upholstery caught fire, then the whole interior, the paint blistered and the tyres caught light. The fire service came and put it out. She didn’t buy the VW.

School for Chauffeurs

If only Mellors had been Lord Chatterley's chauffeur, and trained last century by Rolls-Royce, the vexing business with her ladyship might have been avoided. Gardeners were under no obligation to avoid eye contact with the master's family. It was forbidden for chauffeurs. They could proffer an arm to assist elderly or infirm passengers, with the hand clenched to look reassuring, never outstretched. That would have been too familiar. Well-bred chauffeurs did not swivel round when reversing. They sat upright, turned slightly, or kept their hands on the wheel and used the mirrors. Sticking a head out of the window looked bad and they would never put an arm round the back of a passenger’s seat. The chauffeur’s handbook advised on how to address nobility, diplomats, and people in holy orders including, if he happened along, the Pope. (Above) Back seat chauffeur. 2007 chairman and CEO of Rolls-Royce Ian Robertson, with the owner of the 3000th Phantom.

Caps were doffed for royal personages, and replaced when back behind the wheel. Mellors would have been in no doubt about his place. Rolls-Royce’s handbook said firmly, “Avert your eyes from lady passengers wearing revealing clothing.” Advances from Lady Chatterley would have been rejected and, with his eyes steadfastly downcast, the relationship would never have flourished. Chauffeurs, a French term for firemen or stokers looking after the boilers of steam locomotives, would sometimes get airs, regarding themselves as analogous to the skipper of a gentleman's yacht. They were among the best-paid liveried staff, often selected from coachmen accustomed to looking after carriages and were crucial to a well-ordered household. When an Edwardian car was put away for the night, the fuel tank had to be de-pressurised, the clutch braced so that it would not seize, the radiator drained and sundry items greased or oiled. Drive chains were removed and boiled in tallow, the brass burnished, and the coach varnish needed constant attention.

(right) Original Silver Ghost much polished.

In the 1920s the Duke of Bedford employed 16 chauffeurs, but motor servants got a bad name and the press was full of grumbles about their bossiness, dishonesty and bad driving. “Much of the horror of motoring is centred on the chauffeur,” ran a complainant in 1906. “It is his convenience that must be consulted, it is he who gives the word to stop and to go on, he who decides that you must sleep in Coventry when you intended to go on to Shrewsbury. You may not make plans without consulting him; he is ruthless in his discouragements; he spends your money with a fine liberality.”

With its customary solemnity, Rolls-Royce set up a school for chauffeurs in 1907 which, by the 1980s had developed into a week-long course costing £1,400. It included maintenance, car care, security, first-aid, etiquette, and driving on the road and on the skid-pan. A maintenance lecture included advice on checking fluid levels, changing light bulbs and keeping records. There was a technical briefing, and car care started with washing and polishing - Rolls-Royce advised lots of water, a hose and sponge, and working downwards from the roof. Polishing was encouraged even though its new automated paint plant provided a high-quality gloss. “We take account of the chauffeurs of older cars as well,” said a principal. “There are good practical reasons for keeping a car polished. You can tell if it has been tampered with. Car washes were not recommended and only one newspaper seemed to have the right consistency for cleaning windows, - The Financial Times.”

American chauffeurs only. 1924 Springfield Silver Ghost Salamanca by New Haven, chassis 112JH.

Security was a separate course and included defensive driving. Rolls-Royce would have preferred owners to be unlikely to get involved in that sort of thing, but discreet armour and bullet-proof glass could be provided. Driving standards were strict. Nothing short of Institute of Advanced Motorists or ROSPA Grade 1 was expected, while safety and smoothness were taken for granted. Rolls-Royce chauffeurs were expected to avoid bumping over catseyes, and to know the owner's favourite radio station or CD. Procedures were laid down with care. A well-bred chauffeur knew how to alight, pocket the keys, walk round the back of the car - a relic of coaching - and open the door. He (it usually was a “he”) knew how to wait, not to eat in the car and never smoke. Only suitable material could be read while waiting, such as the car handbook or highway code and certainly not a tabloid newspaper. “Owners do not expect to pay a person to waste time.” There was not much to show at the end of the course except a certificate, a cap badge, a log book and the famous manual. The certificate could be a passport to a job and the course paid for in upper-class wages.

(Above) Torsten Müller-Ötvös 2012 CEO Rolls-Royce.

Weep for a Wolseley

When a serious commentator like Martin Buckley contemplates a Wolseley Six Eighty you are obliged to help. We were a Wolseley family, and while I wouldn’t put the 6/80 among his allegedly rubbish cars, it did have shortcomings. Valves. Wolseley’s obsession with shaft-driven overhead camshafts stemmed from copying Hispano Suiza aero engines during the First World War. It continued as Nuffield Morris Engines in the 1930s, so when a post-Second World War Wolseley was contemplated ohc seemed just the thing. There were two. The 4/50 and the 6/80, essentially Minor monocoque masterworks, developed under Alec Issigonis into cars not so much badge engineered, as family resembled. Torsion bar sprung, with decent ride and handling the 6-cylinder was 7in longer, had bigger brakes and fatter tyres. The middle bit with the doors and boot was pure Morris Oxford with not much room in the back.

Alas, the valves. The 2214.8cc produced 72bhp @ 4,700rpm and you could do over 80mph, but to an 18 year old a 0-60 of about 21sec probably seemed lacklustre, and 6/80s didn’t have a rev counter. Taggart’s service manager grew weary of warranty claims and mentioned, unkindly I thought, to father that the trouble was over-revving. In fact the valves and guides were made from poor materials and overheating was endemic. 6/80s had no temperature gauge. By 1952 the cylinder head and cooling system were redesigned, starting with engine number 20,301. I have no idea if ours was before or after, but it certainly burned a lot of valves. Owners nowadays use Stellite. Father replaced it with an Armstrong Siddeley. So, blemished rather than rubbished for Classic & Sports Car readers. I liked the 6/80, steering column gearshift notwithstanding. Ours was metallic green (top at Dunure, Ayrshire). I was into photographing cars even then – I thought you had to if you wanted to be a motoring writer. Mother had the Wolseley tricked out with trendy tartan seat covers over the fine leather seats; they were as good as new when it was sold.

Pity it didn’t have rack and pinion, like the Minor. They didn’t think R&P would work in a big car and it had low-geared Bishop cam steering. Four and three quarter turns lock to lock meant a lot of wheel-twirling when you were in a hurry. Nice wood facia. Mother liked that. Two big SUs and although there was 57 per cent of the weight on the front I don't remember too much understeer. Didn't really know what understeer was. Got the 6/80 stuck in a sand dune at Troon late one night. Girl involved. I was 18.

Bentley for Bond

James Bond had an Aston Martin as a company car, but when he was spending his own money, and not that of Her Majesty’s Secret Service, he had a Bentley. In Ian Fleming novels he had, “…one of the last 4½ Litre Bentleys with the supercharger by Amherst Villiers. Bond drove it hard and well and with an almost sensual pleasure.”

The DB5 (above with the original and best film Bond), in which he pursued Auric Goldfinger’s henchmen, was invented for the films. Ejection seats, concealed guns, bulletproof visors, the submarine Lotus, the ski-ing Aston V8 and the rocket-firing BMW Z8 were the work of special effects gadgeteers. Ian Fleming’s obsession with Bentleys began when Reuter’s sent him to report Le Mans.

Bentley had already won four times, but the 1930 race was spectacular, a duel between a 6½ Litre Speed Six driven by Woolf Barnato and Glen Kidston, and a 7.1 litre SS Mercedes-Benz. It was an unequal struggle. Yet to Fleming it was British Racing Green versus

Deutschland über alles

. Six Bentleys were up against a solitary Mercedes of Teutonic splendour and wailing supercharger, which lasted eight and a half hours before retiring. Team chief Alfred Neubauer said it had a flat battery but WO Bentley saw water and oil pouring out of the engine. Still, the great white racer, driven by Rudolph Caracciola and Christian Werner, left a deep impression on Fleming. Winning with the unsupercharged Speed Six proved the highlight of Barnato’s driving career. The sole winner of Le Mans on every occasion he took part, his three victories were ruinous for Bentley’s shaky finances. Barnato virtually owned the firm, but could not prevent its sale at a knockdown price to Rolls-Royce. Fleming re-ran the duel in

Moonraker

, 007’s 1930 4½ litre Bentley engaging in a thrilling pursuit of Hugo Drax’s Mercedes. They raced from London to the south coast and only treachery led to the Bentley being wrecked.

Superchargers fascinated Fleming and Amherst Villiers, the engineer who coerced WO Bentley into using them (see right). Bond’s cars sometimes had superchargers even when their real-life equivalents did not. He replaced the 4½ with another Bentley a, “…1953 Mark VI with an open touring body. It was battleship grey like the old 4½ Litre that had gone to its grave in a Maidstone garage, and the dark blue leather upholstery gave a luxurious hiss as he climbed in.”

Thunderball

, published in 1961, had Bond in, “… a Mark II Continental that some rich idiot had married to a telegraph pole.” Bond got Mulliner the coachbuilder (Fleming didn’t specify which Mulliner, but it was probably HJ) to rebuild it as a two-seater a bit like the late Lord David Strathcarron's (right).

He fitted a Mark IV engine with 9.2:1 compression, had it painted in rough, not gloss, battleship grey and upholstered it in black morocco. “She went like a bird and a bomb and Bond loved her more than all the women at present in his life rolled, if that were feasible, together.” The 007 of the novels was subtler. As Fleming’s alter ego Scottish-born Bond was successful with women, liked his Martinis shaken not stirred and was a superb golfer, gambler, lover and driver. His taste was impeccable whatever he drank, smoked, ate, drove or shot with. Fleming demonstrated his exquisite taste in a Rolex Oyster watch, Saxone golf shoes and Bond displayed complete mastery of unexpected skills. Being equal to any situation meant any old gun simply wouldn’t do. Bond used a Smith & Wesson .38 Centennial Airweight, and a Walther PPK 7.65mm with a Berns-Martin triple-draw holster. Fleming did not get his guns right first time and Bond had to change on instructions from “M”. A Glasgow gun expert Geoffrey Boothroyd pointed out to that no special agent worth his calibre would be seen dead with a .25 Beretta automatic. “A lady’s gun, and not really a nice lady”. Fleming repaid the compliment, portraying him in novels as Major Boothroyd, 007’s armourer. Later simply as “Q” Desmond Llewellyn played the role to perfection in the films.

In Fleming’s

Live and Let Die

Bond dismissed American cars as: “…just beetle-shaped dodgems in which you motor along with one hand on the wheel, the radio full on and the power-operated windows closed to keep out the draughts.” But his CIA friend Felix Leiter, “… had got hold of an old Cord. One of the few American cars with personality, and it cheered Bond to get into the low-hung saloon, to hear the solid bite of the gears and the masculine tone of the wide exhaust. Fifteen years old, he reflected, yet still one of the most modern cars in the world.”

Fleming was on shaky ground when he tried inventing a car. In Diamonds are Forever, Leiter introduced Bond to his Studillac explaining: “You couldn’t have anything better than this body. Designed by the Frenchman Raymond Loewy. Best designer in the world.” It was not complete invention. It was really a disguised Studebaker Avanti Fleming was coaxed into by the showy Loewy. The car was a disaster. I tested one in the 1960s, found Loewy’s plastic bodywork pretentious, and it suffered from nightmare axle tramp, slithering scarily in the wet on skinny tyres. An engraved plate reminded the driver that the tyres were suitable only for “ordinary motoring”. The Paxton belt-driven supercharger wafted a light breeze through the carburettor and it managed a perilous 120mph and 11mpg. It was no surprise Studebaker went out of business.

Bond must have been brave to cope with it, although Fleming thought it, “a bomb of a motor car. It cut my drive from London to Sandwich by 20 minutes, just on those Bendix disc brakes. The tremendous rattle of the exhaust note as that big supercharged V8 goes through maximum torque makes you feel young again.” The Avanti may have been a lapse of taste yet as a young reporter in the 1930s, Fleming had been devoted to cars. He owned a khaki-coloured “Flying” Standard, an unpromising start, but as a poorly paid journalist probably all he could afford. He was on firmer ground with the Bentley. The year after he covered Le Mans Fleming co-drove with Donald Healey in the Alpine Rally, winning their class in a 4.5 litre Invicta but in his later years Fleming grew cantankerous. Two women in a car, he averred, would sooner or later look into each other’s eyes. Cars with four women were dangerous because the two in the front would always turn round to those in the back. He disliked dangling dollies, tigers in the back window, steering wheel covers and string-backed driving gloves. He hated Ecosse plates, was against adorning a car with badges and would probably have regarded an Aston Martin as effete. My recommendation for Bond? Something like the Embiricos Bentley (below left) if he had to have a 1930s car. Or a worthy successor like the Continental GT Speed (below right). THE COMPLETE BENTLEY ebook

e-everything

e-mails, e-books (like Dove Publishing produces), and now e-ethanol and e-diesel. You can see now why Audi is racing e-tron quattro R18s (above at Bahrain). It is serious about alternatives to fossil fuels and for the first time I can remember it looks like a practical proposition. Audi e-ethanol and Audi e-diesel are made by combining salt or waste water with waste CO2, sunlight and microorganisms. They are making the stuff in a factory in the New Mexico desert with Audi's American fuels specialist Joule. It is an astonishingly simple process. Genetically modified microorganisms in pipes of brackish water react with CO2 and sunlight, producing ethanol and diesel-range paraffinic alkanes. It needs no biomass. I never really believed in the idea of growing vast crops of that anyway. Now Audi e-ethanol works in petrol cars with only minor changes and e-diesel will work in TDI clean diesels with no modification. Audi says production is “imminent”.

The virtue of these new fuels is in the simple and relatively cheap way they’re made and the materials to produce them are renewable. There is no need for crop-based biomass synthetic fuels have before, so a refinery doesn’t need to be near habitable or arable land. It is being made in the New Mexico desert (see below)and has the same chemical properties as bioethanol produced from biomass. You can blend up to 85 per cent ‘Audi e-ethanol’ with only 15% fossil-fuel petrol for cars running on E85 fuel.

Audi and Joule are starting to make sustainable and pure e-diesel fuel. Petroleum-based diesel is a mixture of a variety of organic compounds, e-diesel DERV is free of sulphur and aromatics and easy to ignite due to its high cetane value. Audi and Joule have had a partnership since 2011, Joule protecting its technology with patents, for which Audi has exclusive rights in automotive. Audi knows how to make the fuels work in engines, and is developing them so that they can be brought to market.

Makes sense. Audi has sometimes looked eccentric in racing. It has competed at Le Mans 14 times since 1999, made the podium every time, and won 11. In 2012 it made history by winning with the pioneering hybrid diesel Audi R18 e-tron quattro.

Audi R18 e-tron quattro #2 (Audi Sport Team Joest), Tom Kristensen (DK), Allan McNish (GB)at Bahrain

Brake:

I do not often agree with this road safety charity, but it is right to worry over 999 drivers being somehow above the law. Blue lights already make them too self-important. Director of Public Prosecutions Keir Starmer QC thinks, “police officers, ambulance drivers, and firefighters sometimes need to drive in a manner that would not be acceptable to others.” He believes prosecution, “unlikely to be appropriate in cases of genuine emergency, unless the driving is dangerous or evidence indicates a high degree of culpability.”

He claims, of course, that his proposals should not be taken as a licence for emergency workers to act as though immune from prosecution. Pious rubbish. Emergency workers already have sensible leeway, but they have far too many accidents. Between 204 and 2012 there were 265 fatalities during, or after, “police related road traffic incidents.” In 2009 police owned up to 3357 accidents. Founding fathers of the IAM, like Bob Peters, class 1 police drivers proud of their exemplary fast and safe driving, would have rejected Starmer’s absurd proposal. Where next? Exemptions for all citizens in cases of genuine emergency? Dashing back to turn the gas off? Letting the cat out? Some emergency Braking is required.