The Romance of Modern Invention: Containing Interesting Descriptions in Non-technical Language of Wireless Telegraphy, Liquid Air, Modern Artillery, Submarines, Dirigible Torpedoes, Solar Motors, Airships, &c. &c.Williams, Archibald
Science
The Romance of Modern Invention: Containing Interesting Descriptions in Non-technical Language of Wireless Telegraphy, Liquid Air, Modern Artillery, Submarines, Dirigible Torpedoes, Solar Motors, Airships, &c. &c.
Williams, Archibald
Inventions
“Several months ago I noticed a locomobile car at Cape Town, and being
struck with its simplicity and neatness, bought it and took it up
country with me, with a view to making some tests with it over bad
roads, &c. Its first trip was over a rough course round Pretoria,
especially chosen to find out defects before taking it into regular
use. Naturally, as the machine was not designed for this class of
work, there were several. In about a month these had all been found
out and remedied, and the car was in constant use, taking stores, &c.,
round the towns and forts. It also performed some very useful work in
visiting out-stations, where searchlights were either installed or
wanted, and in this way visited nearly all the bigger towns in the
Transvaal. It was possible to go round all the likely positions for a
searchlight in one day at every station, which frequently meant
considerably over fifty miles of most indifferent roads--more than a
single horse could have been expected to do--and the car generally
carried two persons on these occasions. The car was also used as a
tender to a searchlight plant, on a gun-carriage and limber, being
utilised to fetch gasolene, carbons, water, &c., &c., and also to run
the dynamo for charging the accumulators used for sparking, thus
saving running the gasolene motor for this purpose. To do this the
trail of the carriage, on which was the dynamo, was lowered on to the
ground, the back of the car was pulled up, one wheel being supported
on the dynamo pulley and the other clear of the ground, and two bolts
were passed through the balance-gear to join it. On one occasion the
car ran a 30 c.m. searchlight for an hour, driving a dynamo in this
way. In consequence of this a trailer has been made to carry a dynamo
and projector for searchlighting in the field, but so far this has
not been so used. The trailer hooks into an eye, passing just behind
the balance-gear. A Maxim, Colt, or small ammunition cart, &c., could
be attached to this same eye.
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.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account