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High Flyer – Morley’s World

Getting caught up in something you believe in that ain't quite the truth, is a great way to come-a-gutser

I’ve just been watching some old footage of some of the earliest attempts to make a flying machine. The video was a mash-up of old silent newsreel and home movie stuff, but it made me realise that it’s so easy to get caught up in what you believe to be the facts, that you sometimes turn your back on reality.

The little film clips I watched did include a huge variety of cunning ideas when it came to making something heavier than air take to the skies. Techniques such as having a series of revolving wings (a bit like a helicopter, I guess). But rather than powering the wings with a single, central engine, the bloke responsible added an individual engine and propeller, sideways on each wing. Ultimately, he wound up with four little aeroplanes flying in a circle. Well, except for the flying bit.

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Other inventors tried all sorts of propulsion devices from being towed by a car, being dragged along by half-a-dozen willing mates, mounting the whole shebang on a bicycle and pedalling like crazy to achieve take-off, and even strapping rockets on a steel plate to one’s back (along with a pair of wings) pulling on a set of ice skates and lighting the wick, while on a frozen lake. Combine that sort of bravado with early combustion engines and highly flammable materials such as timber and fabric and it’s no wonder a bucket of water featured heavily towards the end of each clip. The film clips also suggested that many of those strapped-on wings ultimately became angel’s wings.

But equally, there were an awful lot of would-be aviators that got hung up on the one thing that guaranteed their contraptions wouldn’t work. Now, don’t get me wrong, I’m not disrespecting the bravery or genius that went into these gadgets. Nor am I doubting the intelligence of those who created them. But the mistake so many of them made was to insist that the machine flapped its wings as a form of creating lift. A bit of an easy blue to spot now, but back then you didn’t know what you didn’t know.

Now, you can also easily see how this concept emerged. Anybody who has ever watched a bird take off will know that it flaps them wings to make it happen. Taking what works in nature and adapting it to engineering is often a pretty straightforward way to get successful. But in this case, the idea of creating a flapping motion in a pair of big, heavy wings, was a fast track to a hiding. Or worse.

Unfortunately, while a bird’s wings are super-strong, lightweight creations, the same cannot be said for the bulk of the man-made wings we’re talking about here. Consider that neither carbon fibre nor fibreglass had been invented yet, and you can understand how a timber and cloth wing with a dirty big steel or cast-iron hinge in it to make it flap was always going to be a heavy blighter. Then, take that weight and via a set of levers or a camshaft driven by the wheels, pedals or engine, attempt to make them flap like billy-oh, and it’s no real surprise that the thing had shaken itself to bits in the first few seconds of taxiing.

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The depth of self-belief was impressive, too. Despite watching other wannabe aviators’ attempts scatter their components across a field or burst into flames, the real die-hards weren’t about to be put off by that. Some of them even made multiple attempts at a wing-flapper, discovering each time that mass multiplied by change-of-direction equals rapid, autonomous disassembly. Cue bucket-o-water. At least the spectacular level of failure of this technology ensured that more of these brave fellas survived than might have if they’d actually got off the ground.

The point I’m making here is that getting caught up in something you believe in, when that something is not necessarily the truth, is a great way to come-a-gutser. It wasn’t until aeroplane designs ditched the articulated wing deal and relied on a propeller to give them the speed they needed to create lift, that things started working out differently. Oh sure, plenty of them still crashed and burned, but at least there was the odd sniff of success. (The odd man out, of course, remains the helicopter, which ignores such fixed-wing common sense and consequently spends its entire operational life attempting to reduce itself to atoms and its passengers to corpses.)

So where am I going with this? Well, I think our favourite past-time sometimes leads us down the same blinkered path. There are those out there who insist that a car worthy of these fine pages must be of at least a certain age and must feature elements such as chrome bumper bars. That’s one way to look at it. But for my money, that’s a bit like insisting that your flying machine has flapping wings and is covered in feathers.

I reckon if you went far enough back, there was probably a movement among car collectors to disregard everything that didn’t have a starter handle. And that’s the point: As car design changes, what’s considered old school also changes. Like the 25 or 30-year age limit for club permit schemes, new and ever-younger makes and models are having birthdays and qualifying for permits every year. This is not something to be feared, but it needs to be accepted.

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Many of us don’t think of the Kingswood as old

Time is really the only non-negotiable here. Einstein knew it and understood that anything that happened, happened on a timeline. And that the passing of time was what determined the way we saw things. Relativity, I believe he called it. It’s why a clock moving away from you will tick more slowly than one you’re holding. That’s called time dilation and, provided there’s either velocity or gravity present, it’s a dead-set thing. True. I’m not sure whether Einstein was a Ford or Holden man, but it remains that time (and speed and gravity) changes perception. This may not explain why a HWP cop’s attitude towards you alters with your velocity, but it’s as good as any other theory I’ve heard.

When applied to our pastime, I reckon the same theory of relativity applies in a similar way. If you’re old enough to remember a time before reality television, you’ll also probably regard a VN Commodore as a not-particularly old car. But for those whose birth year starts with a 2, a VN is an impossibly ancient thing full of ghosts and crook plastics.

And just as we older blokes and blokettes remember our dad’s Kingswood or Fairmont or whatever, there are also youngsters out there who have precisely the same memories and feeling towards cars like AU Falcons and VT Commodores. We might think of those two examples as relatively new cars, but for thousands of tappet heads who just haven’t blown out as many candles as us, they’re the HQs and XAs of a new generation.

A pastime like ours can’t afford to stay stuck in a particular era. Imagine if this magazine stopped featuring cars any younger than an HZ Holden. Aside from turning its back on that new generation and everyone that followed it, we’d also go out of business faster than a new Jeep depreciates. Why? Because only blokes with the necessary freight could afford to stump up the drug money currently being asked for an HZ in anything like decent nick. A young fella with a mortgage, a new misso and a couple of rug rats? No hope. But that same young bloke can maybe get into an EF or EL XR6 for sensible money and still keep the bank manager in his box.

Just like partners, there’s one thing a unique car needs to offer to people: Attainability. Not sure what Einstein’s view was on that, but it’d be a valid one.

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Ancient to some, but not to others

Rip Off Autos

There’s an auto parts shop just around the corner from the MBC. It’s one of the big chain ones but its main advantage is that I can walk there in about two minutes when I’ve stripped a bolt or dropped a washer down the storm-water drain and need a fast replacement halfway through a job. Think about it; if the alternator is hanging by its wires, or the manifold is dangling off the side of the block with a fastener missing in action, you can’t just jump in the car and duck down to the parts shop for the right bits. Being within walking distance of such an emporium can be rolled gold, let me tell you.

But I’m not going to use this shop anymore. Why? Because I think the people who work there are taking the piss. Specifically, they’ve tried to rob me three of the last four times I’ve set foot in the joint. And, when I’ve pulled them up on it (I’m not shy about calling out daylight robbery) the bloke behind the counter has got all defensive when apologetic would have been a more appropriate posture to assume. In my humble opinion, of course.

Most recently, I stumbled in through the front door to buy a new chamois (my old one was so decrepit, it actually disintegrated). I found the one I wanted and made a mental note of the price (as yer do). But when I got to the counter and Old Mate scanned the rag, up popped a number a dollar higher than the one on the shelf. Now, a dollar ain’t gonna make much difference to most people, but I’ve got a fleet of shitbox cars to keep me poor, so I don’t need a retail outlet wading in to help in that process. Plus, given that this was the third time in weeks that I’d been dudded, I politely pointed out the discrepancy.

The bloke behind the counter agreed to go and check the shelf price and returned to confirm that, yes, I was correct and that he’d adjust the price. “Must be a different price on our system,” he told me. “We’re not the world champions at this,” in a tone that suggested I was questioning the honesty of his shop, himself and his extended family. Clearly not, but as a retail outlet, you need to get your price-scanning to match the prices on the shelves. Retail 101, I’d have thought.

The bigger problem with this was that “a discrepancy in the system” was exactly the same excuse I’d been given a month or two earlier when I tried to purchase a set of wiper blades. Because I fit my own blades, I don’t need the whole assembly; just the rubber blade and its plastic backing which I fit then trim to the right length. So I get away with a new set of wiper blades for about $10 a pair. Which was precisely the price (five bucks each) I was expecting to be charged when I fronted up to the counter. So imagine my surprise when the geezer held his hand out for $28! But since this was the first time, I laughed it off when the price check revealed the attempted heist.

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As designs change, what’s considered old school also changes

But when another car needed new blades a few weeks later, I went through the whole process again, including the bit where my $10 blades scanned in at nearly 30 bucks. Not only did I point out the error again, but I also added that this was the second time in a short time that the same mistake had been made. But instead of an apology, I got a defensive, semi-spray along the lines of “it was an honest mistake, mate”.

Maybe it was, but if that’s the case, it should have been fixed the first time it appeared, not allowed to crop up again when the next Joe Lunchpail rocked up for a new pair of wiper blades. Maybe they get away with this stuff because most people aren’t as stupid as I am and never go back to the same shop for more of the same. Maybe Joe Lunchpail is smarter than me. Could be.

But I’ll be buggered if I’m going back to have my pockets picked a fourth time. Fool me once shame on you. Fool me twice shame on me. But fool me (or attempt to) three times, and even a dunce like me gets the message. I’ll just have to stop losing washers down the drain.

And here’s the reality: Despite its best efforts, the staff at this shop haven’t been able to put one over on me. Ultimately, because I’ve called it out each time, I haven’t been overcharged a single cent. But they have lost my business. For good. So who’s the dunce now?

From Unique Cars #475, February 2023

 

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