Archive special: How Autocar readers’ concerns have changed

Autocar has invited readers to send in their views and correspondence since the first issue hit the shelves in 1895.

Readers write about a great many topics, covering subjects with insight and inquisition that even us journalists don’t realise.

Reader insights provide us with a valuable glimpse into the reader’s mindset, from reasons behind English motorists being “spoilt children”, to why planes will only be able to fly by one-man apparatus.

Here, then, is a selection of correspondence from Christmases past that demonstrate just how much your concerns have, or haven’t, changed.

1898: Why the public waits 

Having lately conceived an interest in Autocars, I have purchased a few of your journals, and am struck by, what seems to me, the indifference of the makers to the points which are of very great moment to the (would-be) purchasing public, in which I include myself.

We do not care much about differential gears, steam versus spirit, and axles, and are not greatly interested in HP, BHP (whatever that is!), and long-distance racing with mountain climbing, but what we do ask for is that someone shall invent a machine which shall not vibrate, not smell, and not make a noise in its internal organs.

We would like it to take a couple of us up an average hill, to run 12 miles an hour on the level, and not to require repair more than once a month, but these are secondary matters.

To sit on a rumbling, vibrating, and evil-smelling machine outside a shop, or in traffic, and be bombarded by hoots of derision, and the audible comments of passers-by and the great unemployed, requires more sang-froid and courage than, I fear, are possessed by [myself].

1906: The flying problem

True! The attainment of greater engine power has something to do with the achievement of flying, but it will have little, if anything, to do with the perfect flying machine of the future, which will be a one-man apparatus requiring [the occupant’s] manual power only.

We’ve but to review the progress of mechanical science to see how the obstructing forces of nature are overcome by engine power. But we must not forget that engine power overcomes much of the obstructing force by violent means, and this mob energy may not be so readily converted to man’s use in the upper, unstable realm to which [he’d] fly.

In the air, the greater the engine power developed, the greater will be the loss of balance in power pro rata to the weight carried, hence the vital need at present experiments to keep down the power to the lowest possible minimum [for safety].

I am satisfied the true solution depends solely upon the artificial production of wings as flexible and as buoyant as those of a bird, which I believe it is possible to make today.

A feather in the air is less subject to gravity and less at the mercy of the elements in any of the aerial machines made or proposed.

Scientists tell us that in our dreams we have returned to us vague impressions of sensations our ancestors experienced. My ego must therefore have once been in the form of a bird. If so, I have lost my wings and the secret of flight.

Be that as it may, I have thought upon flying until I’ve many times flown in my dreams, and the last I distinctly remember to have seen a host of men, flying singly, who were pelting the earth with ready-made plum puddings, one of which, striking me in the eye awakened me, since when I have tried to banish flying, with all its fleeting glory, from my mind.

I sincerely hope that the many who are induced by the tempting baits offered to essay flying in the impossible machines proposed will take warning from the fate of the plum puddings, for they were all smashed up – no, down! – to atoms.

1910: The lot of the motorist in France

You English motorists are spoilt children, who want something to cry for.

Here in one of the chief provincial towns of France I am taxed £15 12s per annum on my 22hp car, and we never pay less than 1s 10d per gallon for our petrol, and frequently more. On a yearly mileage of 10,000, at 20 miles to the gallon, this works out at from £42 to £50 a year, as against about £33 at average English rates.

There are other items quite as important, such as insurance. I pay £18 a year, of which over £9 is for third-party risks and nearly £4 for my chauffeur; the balance being for fire and the right to carry another servant.

Not a penny for accident to the car itself or its occupants other than servants; a policy covering such risks would cost another £20 at the very least. As in France a civil action is almost invariably brought against the owner of a car [after] an accident, insurance against third-party risks is an absolute necessity; and my policy covers damages to the tune of no less than £4000, [which is] by no means an unusual figure for a jury to award, especially if the owner is known to be well off.

Another grave risk we run is from accident to persons in the car. Two years ago, an accident cost the lives of the owner of the car and a friend; but this did not prevent the friend’s widow from suing the owner’s widow for damages of £32,000.

This case drew special attention to the question, and the insurance company circularised their clients, pointing out the urgent necessity of enlarging the scope of their policies.

I decided the cheapest way out of the difficulty would be to forego the pleasure of carrying Frenchmen in my car, and I now confine myself to my fellow countrymen, whom I can trust not to blackmail my widow in the event of such an accident.

So here you have three items, all of which are considerably heavier in France. Let grumblers at the new licences and fuel tax put that in their pipe and smoke it and be thankful for their manifold blessings.

1928: Suggestion to turn lights slightly 

Don’t you think a lot could be done to stop glare by a little gentle consideration for others by the direction or setting of one’s own head lights before leaving home?

If, for instance, the near head lamp is directed leftwards you get a light on to the grass at the roadside, which is useful in fog or when approaching traffic. Then the off-side head light should be directed so that its rays only take in half the roadway, thus allowing space for the other fellow.

I know it is rather awkward when turning off to the right, or to see a signpost on that side, but, after all, it is only for a very short space of time that you are inconvenienced, and it is in a good cause. Could the practice only become general we should stop glare road-wide. 

I practise what I preach.

1937: What do we care?

My heartiest congratulations on your recent article [criticising urban sprawl along arterial roads].

It is the greatest tragedy of the age that your contributor is right. It is very doubtful if motoring will be tolerable, let alone worth while, if destruction and uncontrolled frightfulness are allowed to continue at the present rate.

I am a member of the executive council of the Bucks CPRE and only know that is a hopeless fight. The entire organised opposition of vested interests, builders, agents, advertisers, electricity companies, speculators and local authorities is a burden far too great for a voluntary society to ever hope to check.

The government simply refuse to supply money or pass legislation. The first because trees bring in no dividends and the second because those in high places have shares in the vested interests which are deliberately destroying our heritage.

What motorists can view with anything but loathing the 20 miles from [Slough] to London? The Bath Road is an almost incredible example of ribbon development, hoardings and general beastliness. Can one be blamed for driving fast in order to leave it behind?

1954: No way to deal with the problem

I read with amusement the altruistic sentiments expressed by Mr D G Lindsay. However, his contention that some form of restriction on the entry of cars into central London will ease or eliminate traffic congestion is based on two misconceptions.

First, he appears to believe that the public transport could absorb greater numbers. Patently, it cannot. The tubes already carry miraculous numbers of passengers in sardine conditions, and travel by bus is impossible for thousands who cover long distances. Secondly, he seems to think that many travel by car for the fun of it.

I can assure him that driving in London is now so difficult, so unpleasant and so expensive – fuel consumption rises alarmingly in jams and there are the inevitable parking fines – that only the insane travel by car if they can avoid it.

The new government bill is typical of this attitude of carrying out small modifications first and letting the big things follow. Parking meters and car testing stations will do nothing to reduce the major cause of accidents – impatience.

Something drastic must be done; if necessary, Mr Lindsay’s sacred City must have new roads knocked through it. Wishy-washy revisions of fines do nothing but give the government an illusory impression of useful activity.

The findings of the Road Research Laboratory are ignored. It is obvious that the useless minor measures now proposed by the government are merely a political safeguard against the coming general election, in case the public finds out too soon that Whitehall just does not know what to do about the problem of roads. 

1965: New speed limits

The [new 70mph motorway] limit will be completely unenforceable. The police, already seriously undermanned, will not have the resources to ensure that the limit will be observed.

I suggest we will find an increase in the breed of individual who, adopting a ‘holier than thou’ attitude, will take malicious pleasure in reporting motorists who, in complete safety, are actually observed exceeding it.

The first four months of [1966] is the most absurd period to choose for an experiment of this nature.

If weather is bad, and present conditions indicate this will be so, the number of accidents will decrease in direct measure to the fewer vehicles using the roads.

If such proves to be the case and the limit becomes permanent because of this ‘proof’ then, I fear, we have finally reached the stage where the omnipresent State is performing yet another function of modern government; that is to say, ‘if the State so decrees, then it must be so’.

1978: BL standards

I must say I was not in a receptive frame of mind to read ‘BL’s defence standards’. I had just completed yet another journey in freezing weather in my four-month-old Jaguar without heating, one of the numerous faults which have been with the car since delivery, and for which it has spent numerous visits to one of Leyland’s main distributors, without as yet satisfactorily clearing the faults.

I have owned five Jaguars and find that each time I take delivery there are more faults than previously, and each time it takes them longer to have them cured and one is treated more indifferently as time goes on.

If BL wish to have a reputation comparable to Marks and Spencer then, surely, they should follow that chain’s example by listening to their customers’ complaints and doing something about them?

In the past three months I have written four times to BL, eliciting only two responses, neither of which have helped or offered to resolve my present difficulties.

1980: Don’t blame the Japanese

It seems fashionable for people to knock the Japanese car industry and buyer. But how many people own Japanese hi-fis, cameras, radios and TVs? 

We have [BL’s CEO] telling us to be patriotic and buy British, but what has Leyland got to offer except out-of-date, predominantly old models?

Any company that has to appeal to patriotism to sell its products is admitting that it has not got much to offer in the first place. I would possibly go out and buy a [Ford] Escort XR3, not to be patriotic but because it is good value for money – and in these inflationary days, money is the number-one priority.

My message to Leyland is, bring out some new, value-for-money models now and not in three years’ time and do not blame the Japanese for being more efficient than you are.

1995: Electrical surge

There seems to be some revulsion about [EVs] and I must say I share some of it; they are characterless machines indeed. But the pace of technological change makes it inevitable that, given a few more years, the boffins will create a mobile source of electrical energy via storage, or production through some form of fuel cell. So then it’s going to be bye-bye ICE for cars.

It will be such a bore, though; no gearbox, nearly no servicing, no water cooling, [huge] performance, no vibration, no street pollution, no differential, one moving part instead of hundreds and silence… I can’t bear the thought of it!