Carload

“ Experience alone will decide the point. The only danger, in my mind, that is to be apprehended, is the injury which roads may sustain by the possibility of the wheel which is acted upon by the Engine, turning round without propelling the carriage, in which case the road would suffer considerably; and this would take place, if a train of Carriages were attached to the Engine, the draught of which was more than the friction or gripe of the Engine-wheel on the surface of the road. ”

“ Springfield Mechanics Devise a New Mode of Travel.
Ingenious Wagon Now Being Made in This City for Which the Makers Claim Great Things.
A new motor carriage, which, if the preliminary tests prove successful as is expected, will revolutionize the mode of travel on highways, and do away with the horse as a means of transportation, is being made in this city. It is quite probable that within a short time one may be able to see an ordinary carriage in almost every respect, running along the streets or climbing country hills without visible means of propulsion. ”

“ Fleming on and since June 1, 1935, was engaged in bona fide operation as a common carrier by motor vehicle 'in driveaway service of new automotive vehicles, finished and unfinished, and new automotive vehicle chassis.' This driveaway or caravaning method of transportation is performed by individual driving of the vehicle under its own power, by driving one vehicle under its own power and towing a second vehicle attached to the first, or by driving under its own power a vehicle upon which another vehicle is partially or wholly mounted. ”

“ The carburetter sprays its vapour into the explosion chamber, the magnet flashes its sparks to ignite it, the cooling water bathes the hot walls of the cylinders—a thing of nerves, and ganglions, and tireless muscles is panting eagerly at your service. You move this lever, you press your foot lightly on this pedal; the engine transfers its power to the wheels; you move. The carriage with you and your friends is borne at railway speed across continents. You can hurl yourself at sixty miles an hour along the great highroads, you can crawl like a worm through the traffic of cities. ”

“ I try to crawl over the top of the truck, between the truck and the bottom of the car. But the space is not large enough for me to squeeze through. This is new to me. Down in the United States I am accustomed to going underneath on rapidly moving trains, seizing a gunnel and swinging my feet under to the brake-beam, and from there crawling over the top of the truck and down inside the truck to a seat on the cross-rod. ”

“ Have you made any observation on the injury done to the road by a Carriage propelled not in the usual manner but by a motion communicated to its wheels?—I think the roads would be less injured by Steam Carriages than by horses, because the wheels will have very little more to carry now than they have with horses, and there are no horses' feet to injure the road, therefore that part of it is saved; the Engines now will be so very light that it will be scarcely felt; the power to draw the Carriage will be very little more than the weight of harness on the horses. ”

“ The car, with its exhaust wide open, for your Italian driver delights in noise, roared down the grade at express-train speed, took the hairpin curve at the bottom on two wheels, to be brought to an abrupt halt with an agonized squealing of brakes, our further progress being barred by a six-inch tree-trunk which had been lowered across the road like a barrier at an old-time country toll-gate. ”

“ Rolling along the straight highroad to Y—— we passed the usual congestion of troop-filled trolley-cars, lorries, ambulances, farm-wagons, officers' autos and motor-cyclists. Our military motor was an excellent one, with the one fault that it seemed extremely difficult for the chauffeur to shift his gear from neutral into low speed, and he would frequently get hung up for several seconds with the car at a standstill till finally he got his gears in mesh. ”

“ Some of the experimental Carriages bad three, some six wheels; all will have four wheels—Some have the Engines in a separate Carriage, and draw the load; some carry the load and Engines on one Carriage. Taking the above circumstances into consideration, which would be most injurious to a road—a Stage Coach, drawn by four horses, weight of Coach three tons, horses two tons, breadth of tire two inches and a half; or Steam Coach, wheels four inches tire, weight four tons ”

“ They'll have to get inside the car to fix that dynamite, you know, and get it ready to set off, and if Jack and I are right behind them, I don't see why we can't lock them inside the car. Then, if the gate is open, we can start the car rolling down the grade, and it will run right outside of the yard and down toward the freight yard. If we really catch them we'll have plenty of time to give the alarm, and they can be taken right out of the car. ”

“ If the Engine, instead of carrying the load draws one or more Carriages after it, the toil should be collected and charged on each Carriage, in a similar manner as it is charged on the Engine, that is in proportion to its wheels. ”

“ Motor-cars were rushing about as numerous as flies in August. Trolley-cars followed one another up and down Seventh Avenue in endless processions. Wagons and trucks stretched along the highway in slow-moving lines as far as the eye could see. Bells were ringing, whistles tooting, horns blowing, motor-cars honking, newsies shouting. The grinding of car-wheels, the rattle of carts, the clatter of hoofs on the asphalt, the shuffling of feet on the sidewalk, and a thousand other noises combined to make an indescribable and confusing roar. ”

“ At the present time the public mind is so greatly agitated on the subject of horseless vehicles, that an illustration of the perpetual motionist's ideas on the subject is given. Here the weight of the vehicle and its occupants bears upon water in cylinders supported on the wheels. The pressure produced in the water in this way is conveyed by means of pipes to the back of the carriage, where it is employed to push the vehicle along. ”

“ In the general description which we have given of the mechanism for carrying, it will be observed, that the preparation for every carriage is stated to be made during the previous addition, by the disengagement of the carrying claw before mentioned, and by its consequent recoil, urged by the spiral spring with which it is connected; but it may, and does, frequently happen, that though the process of addition may not have rendered a carriage necessary, one carriage may itself produce the necessity for another. ”

“ I think there would be very little increase of wear from the effect of the carriage wheels by an increase of velocity; but if the road should be uneven or rough, there would be an increase of wear, in consequence of the impetus or blow with which the wheels would strike the road, after passing over the inequalities in its surface, particularly if the Carriages were made without springs; but whether the road be a good or a bad one, the wear occasioned by the feet of the horses will be greater when they travel with an increased velocity ”

“ No wonder that the Army, from the Commander-in-Chief downwards, is quickly becoming devoted to motoring. The quantity of work that can be got through by means of the automobile is a revelation to those who have been used to travelling by means of horses.
FIG. 30. THE “HERCULES” TRACTION ENGINE, AS USED DURING THE CRIMEAN WAR
By permission of Sampson Low, Marston, & Co., London
During the Crimean War, Boydell’s traction machine was used to haul open trucks on the road and across country. ”

“ I am confident that Carriages to be impelled by Steam machinery turning the wheels cannot be made to answer any good purpose, either for conveyance of travellers or goods, so long as they materially injure the roads, because if the wheels slip materially on the road, or if they cut sensible ruts in the road, they will not advance the Carriage efficiently. ”

“ It is not so with me, for the higher the wheels the deeper may the luggage box be, so that the antidote follows the growth of the danger; and here, from the full conviction I have of its truth, I wish to offer the following opinion: Let seven or eight parts in ten of the total load be within the hind wheels, and let them be at least six feet high, on horizontal cylindric arms, by this disposition, compared against the present, more than one horse in forty would be saved or spared, for the goodness of the draught would come out even through the intricacy of the medium, the fore-carriage ”

“ Next to the engine itself the construction of the transmission gear is the most important thing about an autocar; for as this portion of the machine is the medium through which the power is conveyed from the engine to the wheels, it does not require an intimate knowledge of mechanics to perceive that bad design and undue friction here may make a very material difference in the running and speed of the car. ”

“ I have no doubt, save four out of five, if not nine out of ten stones that are crushed at present, and reduce the road expences in the same proportion; but while the fancy of having carriage-wheels out of upright with crooked axles is continued, wide wheels would be a serious objection; the inside and outside of the wheel being of different diameters, and going different speeds, must cause an increase of load to the horses, because their rubbing on the road and tendency to twist move the stones out of their bed in the road, and, instead of bedding them firmly, has the contrary effect ”

“ Sufficient evidence has been adduced to convince your Committee:—
That carriages can be propelled by steam on common roads at an average rate of ten miles per hour. That at this rate they have conveyed upwards of fourteen passengers. That their weight, including engine, fuel, water, and attendants, may be under three tons. That they can ascend and descend hills of considerable inclination with facility and safety. That they are perfectly safe for passengers. That they are not (or need not be, if properly constructed) nuisances to the public. ”

“ Do you think it essential that the wheels of Steam Carriages should follow in the same track, provided they have a proper breadth of tire?—Not at all, as regards the injury to the road; it would require more power to work them if the wheels did not follow in the same track. ”

“ We find that when moving in large bodies, the utmost speed we can rely upon is about one-and-a-half miles an hour. We have worked out that it takes six bullock carts to move in eighty days what one 2-ton lorry can transport in ten. The bullock carts take up twice [Pg 38] the room on the road for a given load, and in the matter of establishment—a question which you will all realise in the time of war is a very serious one—it takes thirty-five men, drivers, artificers and supervisors to look after what one man could do with a lorry. ”

“ Speed is the delinquent, and the cause of the loss of the great primary advantages: the vehicles on railways are propelled very fast; hence they involve great strength in their construction, and enormous weight in proportion to the paying load carried.
An old stage-coach, according to Nicholas Wood, weighed only 16 to 18 cwts., and would carry upward of 2 tons of paying passengers with their luggage, or about 4⁄10 of a hundred-weight of dead load to every hundred-weight of paying load. ”

“ The vehicle, however, in which the letters and packets are forwarded, in consequence of the wretched roads in the interior, and with the view of expediting the transmission of mail matter, is simply a light, open, eminently uncomfortable, two-wheel waggon, in which but one passenger can be taken each trip. Day and night, up hill and down dale, it continues its journey, changing driver and223 horses every two hours, only the unfortunate passenger being condemned to remain glued to the jolting uncomfortable car, until he has attained the end of his journey. ”

“ It will appear almost incredible, that you and your carriage, horses, coachman, and footmen should suddenly and mysteriously have disappeared. No doubt your captors did not ride out in a body. Some of those you saw there doubtless remained to destroy the carriage; possibly others may have waited a mile or two outside the town. Two, perhaps, would keep some distance ahead of the carriage, and two would follow. No particular attention would be attracted by a carriage, with the blinds down and apparently empty, being driven through the street at a leisurely pace. ”

“ Now, it happened that the gasoline jaunting car was approaching from behind with considerable acceleration. I am sure the buzz wagon could not have been more than ten rods behind me when the cheffonier blew that blast on his horn, and the blasted thing made me jump.
And the machine was moving with such expedience that when I came down I alighted fairly on the cushioned seat in the tonneau. ”

“ There were motor bicycles and side-cars carrying dispatch riders and scouts, travelling kitchens, great lorries, small light cars for supplies needed in a hurry—cars which make greater speed than the motor vans—omnibuses full of troops, and steam tractors or caterpillar engines for hauling heavy guns. ”

“ You have stated that the utmost weight your Carriage would carry, at the rate of ten miles an hour, was three tons; do you think you would be able to carry a much greater weight at the rate of five miles an hour only?—Certainly we should.
To what extent should you increase your power of carrying?—cannot answer that from experience.
At what period of slow motion do you think that the increased expence of fuel would be greater than the use of horses in draft?—I have not ascertained that from experiment; but I think Steam will supersede horses in drawing Carriages, even at low velocities. ”