Dunstall Vs Irving

Interesting story about Irving, as told in the MPH magazine recently. Back in the 1970s one of the Oz members stopped by the Irving's house to get advice on how to proceed with repairing his knackered Vincent twin. Phil quickly realized the man was a serious enthusiast but was short on $. They wheeled the bike into Phil's workshop were it received a complete tear down and rebuild all the way from crankpin out, no charge and most of the parts coming from Phil's cache. Of course the other bonus was getting to watch the man who designed the engine give tutorials on each part of the rebuild as it was undertaken.
The lucky member lived with Phil and Edith for two weeks while all this work was happening, then rode off with an as new engine and trans, done by the best of the best!

Glen
 
worntorn said:
Interesting story about Irving, as told in the MPH magazine recently. Back in the 1970s one of the Oz members stopped by the Irving's house to get advice on how to proceed with repairing his knackered Vincent twin. Phil quickly realized the man was a serious enthusiast but was short on $. They wheeled the bike into Phil's workshop were it received a complete tear down and rebuild all the way from crankpin out, no charge and most of the parts coming from Phil's cache. Of course the other bonus was getting to watch the man who designed the engine give tutorials on each part of the rebuild as it was undertaken.
The lucky member lived with Phil and Edith for two weeks while all this work was happening, then rode off with an as new engine and trans, done by the best of the best!

Glen
Click to expand...
Good story!!
cheers
wakeup
 
I believe Phil Irving was a bit of a rarity. I've never met any other automotive engineer who was actually tertiary qualified. I think most of them are auto mechanics, the professionally qualified ones must all hide somewhere. I've never even heard of a degree in Australia with auto engineering as a major. Phil would have been educated in the 1930s, I wonder where ?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phil_Irving
 
Adrian, I will try to get hold of his autobiography. I believe our education system in the 30s was considerably different. I know that a friend of mine (now deceased) attended Collingwood Technical College in the late 30s and did every automotive course which was available. It interests me that Phil Irving's profession was automotive engineering, and more so if he became qualified in Australia. It would be more evidence of what capability we have lost over the years. I don't believe we have many Phil Irvings left these days. In Australia we are just about to lose our entire car manufacturing capability through government refusal to subsidise uncompetitive industry, or to even try to make it competitive by moving it up-market. The whole approach is to cut costs by slashing wages - if they think that will make us competitive, they have lost the plot.
 
Trust you to find a conspiracy theory in there somewhere. !

Globalisation and the effects thereof has been going on for centuries, millenia even ?
I've heard of several engineers in Melbourne who are consulting to the Chinese motorcycle industry, with complete new designs even.
This is quite public knowledge and well documented.

I'd also comment that in a past life I was involved in computers.
It was very evident there that various chip makers were setting up in numerous countries, with all sorts of subsidies and inducements.
The slightest shift in currency movements saw plants closed down, and others opened up.
The joys of capitalism, with a Capital C, with no social responsibilities.....
 
I'd also comment that Phil irving didn't appear out of a vacuum.
He obtained much of his learning, and material for his books and writings, from previous writings.

e.g. "Motorcycle and How to manage them", and "Speed and how to obtain it".
Pre - WW1 and well pre WW2
There are earlier versions of both, through quite a number of editions.

Dunstall Vs Irving


There is also Victor Pages 1916 book on construction of motorcycles

Dunstall Vs Irving

http://www.amazon.com/Early-Motorcycles ... 0486436713

Not to mention the 1906 version of "How to build a motorcycle".
Which might be a bit basic at that time - but describes and illustrates the construction - from scratch !
http://www.ebay.com/itm/1906-How-To-Bui ... 0448454264

Not to mention the tens of thousands of pages of learned writings in "The Motorcycle" and "Motorcycling".
Some of which are online these days. Lotta browsing/reading there.
Read it, digest it, remember it - accurately ! - and you'll know more than Phil.....
 
Rohan said:
I'd also comment that Phil irving didn't appear out of a vacuum.
He obtained much of his learning, and material for his books and writings, from previous writings.

e.g. "Motorcycle and How to manage them", and "Speed and how to obtain it".
Pre - WW1 and well pre WW2
There are earlier versions of both, through quite a number of editions.

Dunstall Vs Irving


There is also Victor Pages 1916 book on construction of motorcycles

Dunstall Vs Irving

http://www.amazon.com/Early-Motorcycles ... 0486436713

Not to mention the 1906 version of "How to build a motorcycle".
Which might be a bit basic at that time - but describes and illustrates the construction - from scratch !
http://www.ebay.com/itm/1906-How-To-Bui ... 0448454264

Not to mention the tens of thousands of pages of learned writings in "The Motorcycle" and "Motorcycling".
Some of which are online these days. Lotta browsing/reading there.
Read it, digest it, remember it - accurately ! - and you'll know more than Phil.....
Click to expand...

Phil Irving's book 'tuning for speed' is a synopsis of the information which was available on tuning racing motorcycles up to the late 50s. It is the most useful book that anyone racing an old bike can have in their possession. It is the result of a professional engineer looking at an amateur motor sport. The research which has gone into it is extremely accurate. If you wanted to build a better computer what book would you recommend as a basic guide to the options available to you ?
 
I wouldn't disagree with that.
But if you'd had a look at all the above books, it is quite clear that "Tuning for Speed", and "Motorcycle Engineering" are merely updates to the above books.
 
Correctly heat treated, there is no reason that that wouldn't work.
But I wouldn't like to test it !
 
acotrel said:
Have you ever found an error in 'Tuning for Speed' ?
Click to expand...

Since it was compiled from previous editions of similar books, and numerous weekly mc magazine articles, with a readership of tens of thousands (?),
there were a lot of seriously knowledgeable sharp eyed proof readers at work there.... !

Have you read any of those magazines ?
The slightest error or ambiguity got reams of letters pointing this out.
The term anorak was invented for this. ?!

I nearly said rivet counters. But after seeing that the rivetting gangs at work on the Titanic etc were paid by the rivet (correctly) installed,
and there were men employed who did nothing but count/test the rivets (per day), so the pay was correct, its a different concept... ?
 
You might find this interesting :
'During the 1930s and 40s, Phil Irving wrote a technical column in Motor Cycling magazine under the pseudonym 'Slide Rule' [8] some of which were later reprinted in book form as Motorcycle Technicalities. Amongst the other books he authored are Tuning For Speed, Motorcycle Engineering and his autobiography, Phil Irving - An Autobiography.'

How many other motorcycle gurus from the 30s can you name who were in print ? In the fifties many of us relied heavily on 'Tuning For Speed', even into the sixties until the two strokes took over, then it became redundant unless you were a persevering idiot like myself. When I started playing with two strokes, I found that the mindset that I had from reading Tuning For Speed was a disadvantage. The cheap throw-away society had arrived and I had to adjust. The attraction of the Norton is similar to that of the Harley - they are completely rebuildable and you can even build one from scratch. Two strokes are good, however they are a pain in the arse.
 
acotrel said:
Motorcycle Technicalities.
Click to expand...

I have that book in my collection.
Interesting reading.
As were many of his "Slide Rule' jottings in whatever magazine he wrote that for back then.

If you look in all those magazine from back then though, there were whole series of road tests and engine analyses and technical writings and race bike reports and engine tuning articles and how-to by a whole range of folks - Vic Willougby did some of the later ones, and while he was no Slide Rule equivalent they were all very useful and illustrative. The cumulative knowledge in print in those magazines is tremendous through the decades, a veritable wealth of knowledge.

Its important to mention too that back then folks were used to doing a lot of their own maintenance, and their own tuning mods if they were going scrambling or club racing on week ends. Some folks could fit a hi-compression piston and cams for the weekend, and have it back to commuting tune for Monday.... etc etc etc
 
There is currently a lot of discussion going on in Australia about the fate of our national airline QANTAS. One of the comments which was made mentioned the difference between 'professionalism' and 'amateurism'. Phil Irving was different to many, he was a professional engineer, and it shows in his book. I think many people on this planet have never attended a scientific or engineering conference and are unaware of the discipline involved.
 
Your trying to attribute Irving's success to his education? This devalues him and his achievements.
He would have achieved great things had he gone to engineering school or not. Your right about him being a rare breed though, because usually engineers seem to have trouble on the practical level, which is why mechanics dominate the field as you said. He had both practical and theoretical covered.
And you may want to look at union stubbornness which is causing the car manufacturers to hold the government to ransom for years now to share at least part of the blame for bringing down the industry. Very much like Detroit.
 
Unions cannot do much to change a vehicle design to what the customer wants or needs. These days the parking spaces in supermarkets and shopping malls cause difficulty for larger cars. For many years our car manufacturers in Australia had tariff protection and sold us crap versions of American models. Their disregard for their customers was endemic. The only way we can compete with our wages and prices structure is to copy the Germans, go upmarket and charge highr prices for the cars. Germany is highly unionised and pays similar wages, doesn't have our problems. If our cars are not as good as a Merc. Audi or BMW we will never compete at the bottom end as an alternative strategy. Don't believe the crush the unions bullshit, we cannot achieve anything that way. Every Australian industrial organisation must become the best, or we are done.
 
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