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Man vs Auto: Car Maths

December 8, 2009

One classic Aussie bush song sung by Slim Dusty has the words:

But there’s nothin’ so lonesome, so dull or so drear

Than to stand in the bar of a pub with no beer.

To parody this song:

But there’s nothin’ so lonesome, so dull or so drear

Than to stand next to a car made in your birth year!

The Queen

1926 Rolls Royce Silver Ghost

Prince Charles 1948 Standard Vanguard

Camilla Parker-Bowles 1947 Wolseley.

Kylie a 1968 Leyland Mini

Britney Spears 1981 Corvette.

Cars are little time capsules that reflect the hopes and vainglories of an era. Your era. And most of us would be looking at some pretty quaint old models.

Here are some cars from mathspigs family.

This is an Australian Model T Ford or Tin Lizzie produced in the 1920s with my Grandmother at the wheel. The boy (obscured) in the photo is my father. My grandparents owned a small wheat farm at Lalbert in the Mallee, Victoria near where my grandfather was born at – wait for it – Tittybong. The fires came in the 1930s, burnt the crop and the banks forclosed as often happened in the Great Depression. The banks not only took the car but the bridles off the horses!!! The car is important because my grandmother, Eileen, mother of 4 at the time, broke both her wrists crank starting it and her sister, Maggie, reset her sisters wrists on the kitchen table . Top Speed: 45 mph. Fuel consumption: 25 mpg (UK gallon)

My father left school at 13 to work on the farm and went to war at 19 in WWII fighting throughout the Pacific. On his return he married my mother and joined the police force. In the 1960s we, parents and 4 later 5 kids, moved to live on the police station at Kyneton, Victoria. We had the police phone in our kitchen and our car, the FC Holden (right) – ours had a pink door -was the police car. With the police phone in our kitchen, mum feeding the prisoners and our car used as the police car, I grew up in a sitcom. Later I wrote 3 books about it. Fuel Consumption: 9 l/ 100km

In the early 1970s when I went to University I had my first car. It was Horris, the Morris Minor and it was made in 1952, the year of my birth!!!! A car of some character its shock absorbers were shot so it bounced when it hit bumps. When it rained water splashed through holes near the brake while the windscreen wipers tended to flop forward and hit the bonnet (ie. hood) so in rain I had to drive with my hand out the triangular vent window holding the windscreen wiper onto the windscreen. Top Speed: 64 mph (102 kph) downhill with a tailwind. Fuel consumption: 40 mpg (UK Gallon or 5.9 l /100 km).

So here is the challenge mathspigs. Who uses more CALORIES to travel 10 km? A car produced in the year of your birth or you!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Note: If you were born during WWII (1939-45) car production was limited so I will assign you an army vehicle, a 1940 Wily’s Jeep. This includes George W Bush 1946 Willys Jeep.