STORM. F: - IlArfERY SYSTEM s. Numerous at tempts have been made to operate electric rail Wily cars by means of storage batteries carried in them. hut in 1900 there was hilt one storage battery line in operation in the United Slates, this being the Thirty-fourth Street Crosstown line in New York City. Perhaps the most nota ble experiment of several made with storage-bat tery traction in the United States was that ear ried out on the Fourth Avenue Railway in New York City in 1890. Fourteen ears were equipped with 110 cells each, 55 on each side of the ear, under the seats, and were run between the Post Office and the charging station at Eighty-sixth Street, about five miles. The result of these experiments led the officers of the road to eon chide the system impracticable, owing to the great cost, of depreciation of the batteries. Al though the use of storage-battery cars cannot be said to have reached any great degree of practical success, this device has come to have an important use for another purpose. This is the institution of storage batteries of large size to act as regulators in connection with the trol ley or third-rail system of propulsion. Such batteries have been installed on a large scale on some of the largest street-railway systems of the United States, notably the _Metropolitan Traction Company's conduit lines in New York City and the South Side Elevated Railway in Chicago, Ill.
ELEcTatc LOCOMOTIVES AND HEAVY-TRAIN SYS TEMS. There are two distinct methods of oper ating heavy trains by electric power, viz. the electric locomotive pulling trail cars and the multiple- unit system. The electric locomotive has taken two forms in practice: (1) the loco motive proper, and (2) the locomotive ear. The locomotive proper resembles the steam locomotive. with such modifications as are permissible with electric motors, and is subject to the same limi tations as the steam locomotive, in whirl: there are concentrated in a simple unit the weight and power necessary to handle the trains. Space forbids the mention of the various electric loco motives which have been built. Mention should, however, be' made of the Hellmann locomotive, because of its unique character, and of the Gen eral Electric Company's locomotive for the Baltimore and Ohio, and Buffalo and Lockport railways. because they are typical of the most
modern American practice in this class of ma chinery. In the MeiImann locomotive the trucks carried boiler, engines, dynamo, and motors—an electric-power plant on wheels—and the question of transmission was entirely eliminated. This was the only locomotive of this type ever con strueted. In the Baltimore and Ohio locomotive there are two four-wheel trucks, each truck being equipped with two motors, and the weight on the wheels being 192,01)0 pounds, or tU tons. Some of the principal dimensions are: Gauge, 4 feet inches; diameter of drivers, 02 inches: length over all. 35 feet ; height above rail, 14 feet 3 inches; wheel-base of each truck, 6 feet 10 incites: width, 0 feet 10 inches: width, 9 feet 0I1 incites: drawbar pull. 02.000 pounds. Each motor has an output of 020 horse-power, or a total of 1440 horse-power for all four motors_ These locomotives are provided with sand-hoxes. automatic air-brakes for drivers and trains. air whistle, and all the controlling equipment neces sary for performing the duty of a standard steam locomotive. one of these locomotives has pulled a train of 191)0 tons weight and one of 500 tons weight at 35 miles per hour. The Dutra]. and Lockport Railway i- 18 miles long. and is regularly operated by two locomotives similar in all respects to the Baltimore and Ohio locomotives, except in dimensions and de tails. The illustration shows the most modern form of electric locomotive as used on the Metro politan Railway of London. England.
The locomotive car consists of a car-body of the usual form, arranged to carry passengers. with one or both trucks 4-quipped with motors. This type of locomotive ear was used on the famous Intramural Railway at the Columbian Exposition at Chicago in 18113. and is now em ployed on one of the Chicago elevated railways, and on the electrically equipped lines of the New York. New Haven and llartford Railroad, the Brooklyn Bridge Railroad. and some of the London underground roads. With these ears overhead-trolley transmission is used sometimes and sometimes third-rail transmission.