Rear-Engines & Crash-Pads

In the great Berlin office of Mercedes-Daimler-Bentz there was high glee last week as Nazi automotive engineers chuckled over observations made in Manhattan by President William B. Stout of the American Society of Automotive Engineers. "The best way to make the present day car ride easy," declared President Stout, "is to put a lot of weight in the back end. Four hundred pounds of cement in the back seat helps a lot, but if we can put the engine back there and save the weight of the cement we get a better ride, better traction and much more room available in the body of the vehicle. . . . This gives a much better art possibility for appearance than the old-type car. . . . Sweeping lines can be run clear from the front to the rear--no projections, no bumps, smooth contour, and the sleekness of line of a purring kitten."

Since just such a rear-engine car is now in its second year of sleek production by Mercedes, Nazis might well smirk at President Stout's exhortation to the U. S. automotive industry to pull itself together and build likewise. Standardized U. S. cars he found "so alike . . . that a price war has started which eventually must ruin the industry if economic history is right. . . . What is needed at this stage is not so much intellectualism that can design the car, or intelligence that can run the firm, but somebody who is 'smart' enough to make this next move."

Startling to Europeans, but confirming their general impression of what U. S. motoring is like, was this prediction by President Stout: "More attention is going to be paid to crash-padding of the interior. . . . Crashes are going to be a part of automobile ownership and the time has come when they must be taken into consideration in design." Very soon every U. S. car, President Stout hopes, will not only be well padded inside but all projections against which passengers may be flung and gashed if they crash, will be smoothed and rounded, "doing away with all sharp corners, exposed windshield wipers, etc."

Piquant to firms like the English house which lists itself in London's telephone directory as "Rolls-Royce Ltd., Motor Chassis Manufacturer" and builds no bodies whatever, seemed the philosophy of U. S. automotive engineers as capsuled by President Stout: "The car must look right above all things. The machinery part is easy and does not even need to be worried about."

Along with Germans, Czechoslovaks were proud last week that they too have in standard production the rear-engine car of President Stout's production dreams. Made by the great automobile & locomotive firm of Tatra, it sells for about 30,000 koruny ($1,254)

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