ARMOURED CARS AND OTHER MILITARY MOTORS
The Utility of the Armoured Car--Improvised and Other Types--The
Uses of Touring Cars and Motor Cycles--Specially Equipped Military
Motors.
While everyone was aware that the heavy motor would play a very
important part in the great war in connection with the transport of
supplies and artillery, and that touring cars would be largely used
for staff purposes, the enormous extent to which the armoured car
has been employed has probably come as something of a surprise. We
were, of course, aware of the existence of such machines, but up to
the present there had been no real proof of their utility. The German
military authorities had evidently, prior to the war, come to their
own conclusions on the matter, and the Belgians, whether they were
prepared in advance or not, were at least very prompt in following
suit. It is doubtful whether, when the war broke out, our own War
Department was in possession of a single armoured car, but fortunately
this is a type of machine in connection with which deficiencies can
be very rapidly made up, and at the time of writing, while no certain
quantitative information is available, we are at least aware of the
existence of British armoured cars on the Continent, and we know that,
for example, London motor omnibuses have been equipped for this class
of duty. In this, and in most cases, the improvised armoured car is
merely an ordinary vehicle with some simple form of body covered over
by armour plating, and with the more vital portions of its mechanism
to some degree similarly protected. Thus, some protection is provided
for the radiator and steering gear. The dash is covered by steel
plating extending upwards to protect the driver, while the platform
or body behind is protected by vertical or sloping steel plates.
Certain examples of German armoured cars that have been captured
answer sufficiently well to this description, but naturally enough
in a country where the supply of industrial vehicles is more or less
inadequate, the touring car has been selected for adaptation. It has,
of course, the advantage of extra speed, and the disadvantage of the
vulnerability of pneumatic tyres. Some of these improvised armoured
cars merely carry men armed with rifles, while others are equipped with
light machine guns. In many instances, searchlights, or very strong
head lamps, are fitted. The latter can, of course, be operated by the
now familiar electric system, a small dynamo and a battery of cells
being carried upon the car. The most convenient arrangement for a more
powerful searchlight is to be found in the use of a petrol-electric
vehicle in which the ordinary change-speed gears are dispensed with,
and their place taken by electric machines. The car engine drives
a dynamo which generates electric current. This is supplied to an
electric motor from which the power is transmitted to the rear
wheels. The arrangement is tantamount to an infinitely variable change
speed gear, and the important point in connection with the subject
under consideration is that the whole or part of the engine power can
be used for generating electric current, which can be easily applied to
a searchlight on the car.
[Illustration: _“The Autocar” illustration._
A “CHARRON” ARMOURED CAR WITH MACHINE GUN.]
[Illustration: _“The Autocar” illustration._
A “SCHNEIDER” ARMOURED CAR WITH QUICK-FIRING GUN.]
Armoured cars carrying powerful lights are no doubt very effective
for reconnoitring during the night. The lights can be switched on
quite suddenly and some damage inflicted upon an enemy, and the light
switched off again before there is time for fire to be returned or the
machine to be located effectively. The car can then be moved rapidly to
some other point, and the manoeuvre repeated. In general, the armoured
car has been used as a kind of advance guard in front of the screen
of cavalry which performs the double duty of concealing the movement
of its own infantry and locating the forces of the enemy. Just as the
Germans employed cavalry for this purpose to an unprecedented extent in
the Franco-Prussian war of 1870, and so gained an enormous advantage
over their opponents, so the attempt has been made on this occasion
to utilise a still more rapid and effective means towards the same
ends. As already suggested, any advantage that may have accrued from
the utilisation of a new method of this kind need only be a purely
temporary one, since any desired quantity of the enormous number of
available machines can--if it appears desirable--be converted into
armoured cars for our own use or that of our allies at very short
notice. One would imagine that events will prove that the armoured
motor is valuable as an irritant rather than as a means of locating
hostile forces or screening one’s own, since both these latter ends are
very much affected by the use of aeroplanes, which make it practically
impossible to move large bodies of men secure from observation, and
correspondingly easy to gather fairly accurate information as to the
whereabouts and strength of the enemy.
So far we have touched only upon extemporised armoured vehicles as
distinct from those actually designed in the first instance for
this specific duty. The first armoured car was produced as long ago
as 1896. The design was published in _The Autocar_ only a week after
the Act which permitted a motor car to exceed four miles an hour on
British roads, and to dispense with the man walking in front with
a red flag, came into force. The suggestion emanated from the late
Mr. E. J. Pennington, and the machine, the mechanism of which was
necessarily somewhat primitive, was arranged to carry two small machine
guns the cranks of which were to be driven by the car engine with a
view to increasing the rapidity of fire. In those days, the machine
gun was usually hand-cranked. At intervals since that time various
designs had been brought out, the general principle being to employ
a completely armoured car, the driver of which would in most cases
be in considerable danger of accident, owing to the way in which the
protection provided for him obscured the view of the road on either
side. In the majority of cases, the vehicle was designed to carry one
machine gun mounted in a turret above the roof. Thus, in a design
got out by the Charron Company some time back, the machine gun was
contained in a rotating turret a little way forward of the rear axle.
The joint between this turret and the roof of the car involved a flange
and a thick rubber ring. The turret rotated on a central vertical
shaft, and on this shaft was a screw wheel. The effect of turning this
wheel was to raise or lower the turret. When the machine gun had been
drawn into the right position with the turret raised, the wheel was
turned bringing the turret down hard against the rubber ring which held
it securely, and prevented it from shaking about while the gun was
being fired.
[Illustration: _“The Autocar” illustration._
AN ITALIAN DESIGN FOR A MOTOR BATTERY OF QUICK-FIRING GUNS. THE SIDES
SWIVEL ROUND TO FACE IN ANY DESIRED POSITION.]
In another design, coming from the Creusot Works of Messrs. Schneider,
provision was made for a larger machine gun, carried in a substantial
turret projecting from the car roof, and mounted upon rollers running
on an inwardly projecting ring on the lower fixed portion of the
turret. This ring was toothed on its inner side and engaged with a
gear wheel enabling the turret, and with it the gun, to be swung round
into the desired position. The gun itself carried a seat, and the
gear for rotating the turret was connected with pedals, so that a man
sitting on the gun could rotate it and the turret by the action of his
feet, keeping his hands free for the refinements of aiming and working
the weapon.
Reference may be made to one more design for which an Italian officer
was responsible. In this case, the vehicle formed a kind of moving
battery of machine guns, mounted so as normally to point out of the
sides of the car. Each half of the body, however, was capable of
being swung round on hinges either at the back or at the front, and
castors were provided to facilitate its motion. Thus, when the car was
stationary, it was possible to swing round the whole of its armament so
as to face the front, rear, or either side.
[Illustration: _“The Autocar” photograph._
A “MINERVA” ARMOURED CAR WITH MACHINE GUN.]
If the general conclusion as to the utility of armoured motor cars
bears out the impressions formed in the earlier portions of the war,
there can be little doubt that these more comprehensive designs will
receive in the near future consideration which has been denied to them
in the past, and that types of armoured car will be evolved as much
more effective than the extemporised patterns as our armoured cruisers
are when compared with converted merchant ships.
Without devoting too much space to the consideration of machines
which are as yet merely proposals and not actualities, brief mention
may be made of a design recently got out by a British engineer, and
representing in a sense the last word in armoured cars, since it is
in no sense a make-shift, and provides for the complete protection of
the driver and every item of the mechanism. The car is, of course,
completely enclosed, and from its roof projects an armoured turret
containing two machine guns. The driver gets his view of the road only
through louvres in front and in the side doors. The lines of the car
consist of a series of curves which are preferred to flat surfaces,
in order to increase to a maximum the possibility of deflecting any
bullets which strike the vehicle. Even the radiator and the tyres are
armoured. The former is situated against the dashboard, and has above
it a cover in the shape of a cupola through which the air is drawn down
by a fan round the vertical tubes. Each wheel is built up of two steel
discs, one inside the other, and an air tube covered by strong fabric
is placed between the two. The outer disc is allowed sufficient freedom
of movement to enable the arrangement to approximate the pneumatic tyre
in effect, while being completely protected from puncture from any
cause.
It is reasonable to suppose that the near future will see considerable
developments in the armoured motor car in two directions, namely, in
the direction of the vehicle designed and constructed throughout for
a specific purpose, and also in the direction of the lightly armoured
fast touring car available for staff and scouting purposes.
This last brings us to the subject of a very valuable sphere of
activity of motors in warfare. There is, however, but little to be
written on this point, since the general use of cars by staff officers
from the commander-in-chief downwards may be taken for granted, and the
employment of fast vehicles for scouting purposes and by officers of
the Intelligence Department is equally self-evident. For the carrying
of dispatches and other such work, the motor cycle is being found
extremely useful. This, the lightest class of motor vehicle, is also
used in conjunction with its heavier relations. Motor cyclists, who
are usually skilled mechanics, are attached to all the heavy motor
transport columns, their duties being to scout ahead, to keep the units
of the column together, and also to assist in the event of any roadside
trouble.
Motors of all kinds are extensively used in connection with the flying
corps. To each squadron of aeroplanes a number of motors are attached
for various duties. Some may act as first-aid machines, and for the
carriage of spare parts. Other larger and heavier motors are employed
for the carriage of partially dismantled aeroplanes. Others, again, are
fitted up as workshops to help in the important work of repairing and
keeping in tune the engines and mechanisms of the aeroplanes.
As regards other important uses of motors in warfare, brief mention
should at least be made of the cars fitted with wireless telegraphy
equipments, and portable searchlights, and also of motor field
kitchens.