In Figure 4 it will be seen that the internal arrangement of a street locomotive, as regards the boiler, corresponds with that of a locomobile (pz. 96, fig. 3), the fire-box with the grate (omitted in the Figure) being surrounded by a vertical water-leg (seen to the left). The further arrange ment consists of a group of narrower smoke- or fire-flues in a horizontal cylindrical boiler and a smoke-box (seen at the right) carrying the stack. Street-locomotives being tender-engines, a water-tank is provided under the engineer's place (at the left), with the driving-axle between it and the boiler. In this locomotive the engine, with its link-motion, is under the boiler, and the mechanism required for guiding the small front wheels is carried through the smoke-box, so that it can be managed from the foot board by a horizontal shaft and screw-wheels.
1824, David Gordon patented an arragement (previously proposed) 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, 13urstall Hill made a steam-carriage in which the engine was like Evans's, except that its cylinder was at the end of the beam and the connecting-rod in the middle.
In 1827, Gurney built a steam-carriage which worked for about two years in and around London, one of its trips covering eighty-five miles in ten hours, including all stops. In 1828 he built a steam-carriage having a sectional boiler. Its cylinders were horizontal and the valve-gearing was driven by an eccentric on the rear axle. The link was moved by a cord running from the driver's scat. There was a separator to dry the steam, a forced draft, and a feed-heater; and the valve cut of the steam at about one-half stroke.
In 1329, Anderson and James built a road-engine which weighed three tons and carried fifteen passengers on a rough gravelled road at from twelve to fifteen miles per hour. The same year Hancock built a road-engine with a boiler consisting of a collection of flat chambers with boiler-plate sides, the chambers being connected by tubes and stays. In 1831 lie placed a steam-carriage on the road between London and Stratford, where it ran regularly; while at the same time Dance had one running between Chel tenham and Gloucester, where it ran back and forth thirty-five hundred miles, running the nine miles, the distance between the two places, in fifty-five minutes, and meeting with but one mishap, which was the result of malice. Ogle & Summer's steam-carriage ran from thirty-two to thirty five miles an hour, carrying two hundred and fifty pounds of steam. Han
cock's " Infant " of 1831 ran from Brighton to London, carrying a party of eleven, at from nine to fifteen miles per hour.
Hancock's "Autopsy" of 1833 went about the streets of London at all times without difficulty. It is shown in Figure 1 (51. io3). By this time there were about twenty steam-carriages and traction road-engines running in England, where good roads had aided the inventors and builders; but hostile leg4lation checked the advance of this method of conveyance.
The external appearance of a steam-carriage according to Rickett's construction—that is, a carriage driven by steam and adapted for the transportation of persons—is represented in Figure 7, while the inter nal arrangement of a steam-omnibus can be seen in Figure 3. On the left is a seat for the stoker in front of the boiler, which is similar to that of a locomotive, but considerably shorter. On the right over the run ning-axle is a seat for the driver, who controls the throttle and reverse lever in front. In the centre on the tender are upholstered seats for eight persons, and an awning or roof can be arranged, as indicated by the clotted lines. An engine under the seats acts through a transmitting shaft and gear-wheels on the driving-axle (on the left) placed under the horizontal portion of the boiler.
No steam-carriage, steam-omnibus, street-locomotive, or traction engine has been invented which could justify the supposition that it could enter into a general, effective competition with the prevailing mode of carriage. Even street-cars driven by ammonia-engines, which at one time created a great sensation in America, seem to have been abandoned, notwithstand ing the satisfactory experiments by General Beauregard.
Experimental machines have been constructed in which traction has been obtained by pedals or feet which pressed against the ground as an abutment, these being given an alternating movement by which the wheeled carriage bearing the motor was propelled. The feet were raised and lowered and the legs to which they were attached were given a back ward and forward motion. There is no question about the traction thus obtained being much in excess of that obtained by the adhesion of a metal tire to a metal rail, or of a metal, wooden, or rubber tire working upon • an ordinary road surface; but the machine itself is of necessity burdened with faults of design, construction, and operation, and the device is not worthy of being called practical.