Scientific American Supplement, No. 620, November 19,1887 eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 135 pages of information about Scientific American Supplement, No. 620, November 19,1887.

Scientific American Supplement, No. 620, November 19,1887 eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 135 pages of information about Scientific American Supplement, No. 620, November 19,1887.

Mr. Mailloux asked if I would give my experience in regard to the mechanical transmission between the motor and the car axle.  I have used almost everything that was known at the time, but in order to give you a full and detailed account of the various modes of transmission which I have used I should have to give you figures to bear out certain experiments.  I should only be able to do that in a lecture of at least five hours’ duration, so I hope that you will kindly excuse me on that point.

With regard to the durability of plates, I have taken into consideration fifteen hours a day.  In regard to the application of electrical brakes, I will say that that was one of the first ideas that entered my head when I began to use electric motors, and other people had that idea long before me.  I have used an electric brake, using the motor itself as a brake—­that is, as the car runs down a grade by momentum, it generates a current, but this current cannot be used for recharging a battery.  It is utter nonsense to talk about that unless we have a steady grade four or five miles long.  The advantages are very small indeed, and the complications which would be introduced by employing automatic cut-outs, governors, and so on, would counterbalance anything that might be gained.  As regards going up an incline, of course stopping and starting again has to be done often, and anybody who at any time works cars by electricity, whether they have storage batteries or not, has to allow for sufficient motive power to overcome all the difficulties that any line might present.

One of the great mistakes which some of the pioneers in this direction made was that they did not put sufficient power upon the cars.  You always ought to put on the cars power capable of exerting perhaps 20 to 40 per cent. more than is necessary in the ordinary street service, so that in case of the road being snowed up, or in the case of any other accident which is liable to occur, you ought to have plenty of power to get out of the scrape.

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BRISTOL CATHEDRAL.

[Illustration:  BRISTOL CATHEDRAL.]

An Augustinian monastery, founded by Robert Fitzhardinge in 1142, had its church, of Norman architecture, to which additions were made in the early English period.  When Edmund Knowle was abbot, from 1306 to 1332, the Norman choir was replaced by that which now exists.  His successor, Abbot Snow, built the chapels on the south side of the choir.  Abbot Newland, between 1481 and 1515, enriched the transepts with a groined roof and with ornamental work of the decorated Gothic style, and erected the central tower.  Abbot Elliott, who followed Newland, removed the Norman nave and aisles, intending to rebuild them; but this was prevented by his death in 1526 and by the dissolution of the monastery a few years afterward; he completed, however, the vaulting of the south transept.  The church

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Scientific American Supplement, No. 620, November 19,1887 from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.