Introduction of the Locomotive Safety Truck: Contributions from the Museum of History and Technology: Paper 24 — John Shaqi
Introduction of the Locomotive Safety Truck: Contributions from the Museum of History and Technology: Paper 24White, John H.
History
Introduction of the Locomotive Safety Truck: Contributions from the Museum of History and Technology: Paper 24
White, John H.
Locomotives; Railroads -- Safety applications
The British journal _Engineering_, in an article otherwise friendly to
the inventor, expressed some skepticism as to the real merit of Hudson's
invention.[15]
If Mr. Hudson's truck, ... be examined, it will be seen that the
radius link serves no other purpose than that of carrying the truck
along with the engine, and this could obviously be equally done by
the pivot or central pin of the truck itself.
It is probable that few builders other than Rogers made use of the
Hudson radial link.[16] One of these was John Headden, whose _General
Darcy_, shown in figure 6, was fitted with the Hudson truck.
Thus, by 1860 there had been perfected and adopted a successful 4-wheel
safety truck for 4-4-0's and 4-6-0's used in general mixed and passenger
service. But as the decade advanced, the need grew for heavy freight
engines that could be safely run at speed. Without a pilot truck, the
leading driving axle of the freight engine was generally overloaded.
While the application of a 4-wheel truck reduced this front-end overload
and permitted faster running it materially reduced the traction of the
drivers by bearing too great a portion of the total weight. This loss of
traction was of course highly undesirable and generally disqualified the
use of 4-wheel trucks for freight engines. What was needed was a truck
which would guide the 0-6-0's and 0-8-0's around curves and yet leave
the greater portion of the weight on the drivers. The 2-wheel, or pony,
truck met these requirements.[17]
[Illustration: FIGURE 9.--Running gear and truck designed by John L.
Whetstone, as shown in the drawing for U.S. patent 27850, issued April
10, 1860.]
Levi Bissell produced the basic patent for such a truck in 1857. Zerah
Colburn in September of that year had suggested to Bissell that he
develop a 2-wheel truck. Such a device, he believed, would be well
received in Britain.[18] He was quite correct, as will shortly be seen.
In nearly every respect Bissell's 2-wheel truck (see fig. 7) followed
the idea of the original patent for the 4-wheel truck, which he claimed
as the basis for the present invention. The pintle was located behind
the truck axle, near the front driving-wheel axle, and the weight was
carried by incline planes that also served as the centering device.
A study of the patent drawing in figure 7 reveals several interesting
points. Note that the V's, and thus the point of bearing, are slightly
in front of the center line of the truck axle. It was suggested in the
patent specification that the V's might be placed to the front, rear, or
directly over the axle, but in most actual applications they were placed
directly over the axle. Note also that the locomotive shown on the
figure is obviously a standard high-wheel American type which has
suffered the rather awkward substitution of a pony truck for its regular
4-wheel arrangement. It is probable that few if any American types were
so rebuilt.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account