STEAM VEHICLES or STEAM CAR RIAGES, as the name implies, are carriages or conveyances in which steam is used as the motive power. The name is now usually ap plied to those vehicles which preceded the steam locomotive on rails and were designed for use on the ordinary highways. In 1824 David Gordon patented an arrangement for fitting to a steam-engine a set of jointed legs in imitation of the action of a horse's feet. In the same year Burstall and Hill made a steam-carriage in which the engine was like Evans', except that its cylinder was at the end of the beam and the connecting-rod in the middle. Earlier efforts to construct a steam vehicle were made by Robinson and by Watt in 1759 and by Cugnot 10 years later, but it was not until the third decade of the 19th century that the steam-engine had been sufficiently developed to tempt inventors to try to adapt it to road service. In 1827 Gurney built a steam carriage which worked for about two years in and around London, one of its trips covering 85 miles in 10 hours, including all stops. In 1828 he built a steam-carriage having a sec tional boiler. Its cylinders were horizontal and the valve-gearing was driven by an eccen tric on the rear axle. The link was moved by a cord running from the driver's seat. There was a separator to dry the steam, a forced draught and a feed-heater; and the valve cut off the steam at about one-half stroke. In 1829 Anderson and James built a road-engine which weighed three tons and carried 15 pas sengers on a rough graveled road at from 12 to 15 miles per hour. The same year Han cock built a road-engine with a boiler con sisting of a collection of flat chambers with boiler-plate sides, the chambers being con nected by tubes and stays. In 1831 he placed
a steam-carriage on the road between London and Stratford, where it ran regularly; while at the same time Dance had one running be tween Cheltenham and Gloucester, where it ran back and forth 3,500 miles, running nine miles, the distance between the two places, in 55 minutes and meeting with but one mis hap, which was the result of malice. Ogle and Summer's steam-carriage ran from 32 to 35 miles an hour, carrying 250 pounds of steam. Hancock's /n/ant of 1831 ran from Brighton to London, carrying a party of 11, at from nine to 15 miles an hour. Hancock's Autopsy of 1833 went about the streets of London at all times without &faculty. By this time there were about 20 steam-carriages and traction road engines running in England, where good roads had aided the inventors and builders; but hostile legislation checked the advance of this method of conveyance. Moreover the life of a steam-vehicle was very short, due to ex cessive vibration. No steam-carrialge, steam omnibus, street-locomotive or traction engine became a serious competitor to the horse car riage throughout the 19th century and in the closing years of the latter the automobile ar rived, fitted with an internal combustion engine and pneumatic tires which eliminated all ex cessive vibration and the doom of the steam vehicle was finally sealed.