Dudgeon, an engineer, of New York. It had two steam cylinders, each three
inches in diameter and with sixteen-inch stroke, and drew a light carriage
at ten miles an hour on gravel roads. The carriage was destroyed by fire
at the New York Crystal Palace in 1858. Dudgeon is said to have afterward
built another carriage, which was larger and more clumsy than the other. A
few years ago this was discovered in an old barn in Locust Valley, L. I.
It was fixed up and started out and demonstrated that, old as it was, it
could go at a speed of more than ten miles an hour.
LOUGH AND MESSENGER
In 1858, Messrs. Lough and Messenger, of Swindon, England, designed and
erected a steam-road locomotive which for two years ran at fifteen miles
an hour on level roads, and six miles an hour up grades of one in twenty.
The engine had two cylinders, each three and one-half inches in diameter
and with five-inch stroke, working direct on to the crank axle. The
driving wheels were three and one-half feet in diameter, and the leading
wheels two feet in diameter. The vertical boiler fixed on the frame was
worked at one-hundred-and-twenty-pound pressure. The tanks held forty
gallons of feed water. The total weight of the locomotive was eight
hundred pounds.
THOMAS RICKETT
When the revival of interest in the common-road steam locomotive began in
England, about 1857, Thomas Rickett, of Castle Foundry, Buckingham, was
one of the first to give attention to the subject. He built a road
locomotive in 1858 for the Marquis of Stafford. This engine had two
driving wheels and a steering wheel. The boiler was at the back with the
steam cylinders horizontally on each side of it. Three passengers were
carried.
The carriage was steered by means of a lever connected with the fork of
the front wheel. The cylinders were three inches in diameter, with
nine-inch stroke; the working steam pressure was one hundred pounds per
square inch. The driving wheels were three feet in diameter. The weight of
the carriage when fully loaded was only three thousand pounds. On level
roads the speed was about twelve miles an hour.
An account of one of the trips in 1859 was as follows in the columns of
The Engineer: "Lord Stafford and party made another trip with the steam
carriage from Buckingham to Wolverton. His lordship drove and steered, and
although the roads were very heavy, they were not more than an hour in
running the nine miles to Old Wolverton. His lordship has repeatedly said
that it is guided with the greatest ease and precision. It was designed by
Mr. Rickett to run ten miles an hour. One mile in five minutes has been
attained, at which it was perfectly steady, the centre of gravity being
not more than two feet from the ground. A few days afterwards this little
engine started from Messrs. Hayes' Works, Stoney Stratford, with a party
consisting of the Marquis of Stafford, Lord Alfred Paget, and two
Hungarian noblemen. They proceeded through the town of Stoney Stratford at
a rapid pace, and after a short trip returned to the Wolverton railway
station. The trip was in all respects successful, and shows beyond a doubt
that steam locomotion for common roads is practicable."
Two other engines were built by Rickett, one of them for the Earl of
Caithness. Some improvements were installed in this carriage, which was
intended to carry three passengers. The weight of the carriage, fully
loaded, was five thousand pounds.
In this carriage, the Earl of Caithness traveled from Inverness to his
seat, Borrogill Castle, within a few miles of John o' Groat's House. He
describes his trip as follows: "I may state that such a feat as going over
the Ord of Caithness has never before been accomplished by steam, as I
believe we rose one thousand feet in about five miles. The Ord is one of
the largest and steepest hills in Scotland. The turns in the road are very
sharp. All this I got over without trouble. There is, I am confident, no
difficulty in driving a steam carriage on a common road. It is cheap, and
on a level I got as much as nineteen miles an hour." The Earl of Caithness
brought the trial to a successful result, and some expert authorities
jumped to the conclusion that at once steam traveling upon the high roads
of England would be availed of to a large extent; but that did not happen.
In 1864, Mr. Rickett furnished an engine for working a passenger and light
goods service in Spain, intended to carry thirty passengers up an incline
of one in twelve, at ten miles an hour. The steam cylinders were eight
inches in diameter, and the driving wheels four feet in diameter. The
boiler would sustain a pressure of two hundred pounds. Rickett's later
engines had spur wheels; but his last engines were direct-acting. In
November, 1864, he says: "The direct-acting engines mount inclines of one
in ten easily; whether at eight, four, two, or one mile an hour, on
inclines with five tons behind them, they stick to their work better than
geared engines."
DANIEL ADAMSON
In 1858 the firm of Daniel Adamson & Co., of Dukinfield, near Manchester,
England, built a common-road locomotive for a Mr. Schmidt. A multi-tubular
boiler was used, two and one-half feet in diameter and five and one-half
feet long, with a working pressure of one hundred and fifty pounds per
square inch. The engine, which weighed five thousand six hundred pounds
and was borne on three wheels, was calculated to run at eight miles an
hour. A steam cylinder of six-inch diameter was attached to each side of
the locomotive, and these cylinders actuated a pair of driving wheels
three feet six inches in diameter.
Mr. Schmidt gave this vehicle a thorough trying out and especially raced
it with several competitors. On one of these races, in 1867, with a
Boulton steam carriage, the start was made from Ashton-under-Lyne, for the
show ground at Old Trafford, a distance of over eight miles. Although the
Adamson engine was the larger, the smaller one easily passed it during the
first mile, and kept a good lead all the way, arriving at Old Trafford
under the hour.
Mr. Schmidt sent his road locomotive to the Havre Exhibition, in 1868, and
a trial of its powers was made by French engineers, and M. Nicole,
director of the exhibition. Mr. Schmidt conducted the engine himself, and
to it was attached an omnibus containing the commissioners. The engine and
carriage traversed several streets of Havre and mounted a sharp incline.
Other trips were made to several villages in the neighborhood of the
exhibition, and the engine behaved very satisfactorily.
STIRLING
In a road steamer designed by Stirling, of Kilmarnock, in 1859, the five
traveling wheels were mounted upon springs. A single wheel was used as a
driver, and more or less weight was thrown upon this wheel. The leading
and trailing wheels swiveled in concert, in opposite directions, by means
of right and left hand worms and worm wheels. The carriage was thus made
to move in a curve of comparatively short radius.
W. O. CARRETT
In 1860, George Salt, of Saltshire, England, employed W. O. Carrett, of
the firm of Carrett, Marshall & Co., proprietors of the Gun Foundry at
Leeds, to design and build a steam pleasure carriage for him. The
carriage was first shown and exhibited at the Royal Show held in Leeds,
1861, and likewise at the London Exhibition, 1862. It had two steam
cylinders, six inches in diameter and with eight-inch stroke. The boiler
was of the locomotive multi-tubular type, two feet six inches in diameter,
and five feet three inches long. It had a working pressure of one hundred
and fifty pounds per square inch, the test pressure being three hundred
pounds. The locomotive was mounted upon two driving wheels, each four feet
in diameter, made of steel, and a leading wheel was three feet in
diameter. Seats were provided for nine persons, including the steerer and
the fireman. The traveling speed was fifteen miles an hour; and the weight
of the carriage, fully loaded, was five tons. Motion was communicated from
the crank shaft to the driving axle through spur gearing.
The English magazine, Engineering, in an article in June, 1866, said:
"This steam carriage, made by Carrett, Marshall & Co., was probably the
most remarkable locomotive ever made. True, it did little good for itself
as a steam carriage, and its owner at last made a present of it--much as
an Eastern prince might send a friend a white elephant--to that
enthusiastic amateur, Mr. Frederick Hodges, who christened it the
Fly-by-Night, and who did fly, and no mistake, through the Kentish
villages when most honest people were in their beds. Its enterprising
owner was repeatedly pulled up and fined, and to this day his exploits are
remembered against him." Hodges ran the engine eight hundred miles; he had
six summonses in six weeks, and one was for running the engine thirty
miles an hour. It was afterwards altered to resemble a fire engine and the
passengers were equipped like firemen, wearing brass helmets. The device
did not deceive the police, and finally the carriage was made over into a
real self-moving fire engine.
RICHARD TANGYE
The steam carriage built by the Tangye Brothers, of England, about 1852,
was a simple affair. It had seating capacity in the body for six or eight
persons, while three or four more could be accommodated in front. The
driver who sat in front had full control of the stop valve and reversing
lever, so that the engine could be stopped or reversed by him as occasion
required. The speed of twenty miles an hour could be attained, and the
engine with its load easily ascended the steepest gradients.
Richard Tangye, in his autobiography, speaks of his experience with this
carriage in the following terms: "Great interest was manifested in our
experiment, and it soon became evident that there was an opening for a
considerable business in these engines, and we made our preparations
accordingly, but the 'wisdom' of Parliament made it impossible. The
squires became alarmed lest their horses should take fright; and although
a judge ruled that a horse that would not stand the sight or sound of a
locomotive, in these days of steam, constituted a public danger, and that
its owner should be punished and not the owner of the locomotive, an act
was passed providing that no engine should travel more than four miles an
hour on the public roads. Thus was the trade in quick-speed locomotives
strangled in its cradle; and the inhabitants of country districts left
unprovided with improved facilities for traveling." The Tangye carriage
thus driven out of England was sent to India, where it continued to give
good service.
T. W. COWAN
At the London Exhibition of 1862, the Messrs. Yarrow and Hilditch, of
Barnsbury, near London, exhibited a steam carriage, designed and made by
T. W. Cowan, of Greenwich. Eleven passengers, besides the driver and the
fireman, were carried and the vehicle with full load weighed two tons and
a half. The boiler, of steel, was a vertical multitubular two feet in
diameter and three feet nine inches high. The frame of the carriage was of
ash, lined with wrought-iron plates, and to the outside of the bottom sill
were two iron foundation plates, to which the cylinders and other parts
were attached. The cylinders were five inches in diameter and had
nine-inch stroke.
CHARLES T. HAYBALL
A quick-speed road locomotive was made by Charles T. Hayball, of
Lymington, Hants, England, in 1864. The machinery was mounted upon a
wrought-iron frame, that was carried upon three wheels. The two driving
wheels had an inner and an outer tire, and the space between was filled
with wood to reduce noise and lessen the concussion. The two steam
cylinders were each four and one-half inches in diameter and with six-inch
stroke. Hayball used a vertical boiler, two feet two inches in diameter,
and four feet high, working at a pressure of one hundred and fifty
pounds. The carriage ran up an incline of one in twelve at sixteen miles
an hour, and traveled four miles an hour in fourteen minutes, up hill and
down, with ten passengers on board.
ISAAC W. BOULTON
In August, 1867, Thomas Boulton says: "I ran a small road locomotive
constructed by Isaac W. Boulton, of Ashton-under-Lyne, from here through
Manchester, Eccles, Warrington, Preston Brook, to Chester, paraded the
principal streets of Chester, and returned home, the distance being over
ninety miles in one day without a stoppage except for water." Boulton's
engine had one cylinder four and one-half inches in diameter, and with
nine-inch stroke. The boiler worked at one hundred and thirty pounds
pressure per square inch. The driving wheels were five feet in diameter.
Two speeds were obtained by means of spur gearing between the crank shaft
and the counter shaft. On the Chester trip six persons, and sometimes
eight and ten passengers, were carried.
ARMSTRONG
The virtues of the horseless vehicle early penetrated to India. Many
English manufacturers sent carriages there. Some time in 1868, a steam
carriage, with two steam cylinders, each three inches in diameter, and
with six-inch stroke, was made by Armstrong, of Rawilpindee, Punjab. A
separate stop valve was fitted to each cylinder. The boiler was fifteen
inches in diameter and three feet high, and worked steam pressure of one
hundred pounds per square inch. Twelve miles an hour on the level, and six
miles an hour up grade of one in twenty, were made. The driving wheels
were three feet in diameter.
PIERRE RAVEL
Ravel, of France, planned in 1868 a steam vehicle, and about 1870
completed the construction of one at the barracks at Saint-Owen. Then came
the declaration of war with Prussia, and the barracks, being within the
zone of fortification, the vehicle was lost or destroyed. There is no
certainty that it was ever unearthed after peace was declared.
L. T. PYOTT
Before 1876, a motor vehicle was invented by L. T. Pyott, who was then a
foreman with the Baldwin Locomotive Works in Philadelphia. The carriage,
which could carry seven persons at the rate of twenty miles an hour, cost
about two thousand two hundred dollars, and weighed nearly two tons. It
was shown at the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia in 1876, but was
not allowed to run on the streets.
A. RICHTER
An engineer and mechanician of Neider-Bielan, Oberlaneitz, Germany,
Richter secured in 1877 a patent for a vehicle that was propelled by a
motor consisting of a stack or battery of elliptic springs horizontally
disposed, which were compressed by a charge of powerful powder exploded in
what was practically a cannon. The subsequent expansion transmitted the
driving effort to the wheels by a rack of gears. The success of this
vehicle is not generally known.
RAFFARD
In 1881, Raffard, a French engineer, made a tricycle and a tram-car that
is said to have been the first electric automobile which ran
satisfactorily.
CHARLES JEANTEAUD
It is claimed for Jeanteaud that he built a four-wheeled electric vehicle
about 1881, which was changed in 1887 by the addition of an Immisch motor.
In 1890 he constructed a three-wheeled steam vehicle for five persons,
having the advice and interest of Archdeacon. In June, 1895, at the
Paris-Bordeaux race, he entered an electric automobile and established
battery relays every twenty-five kilometers, but without success so far as
speed was involved in comparison with the gasoline cars. In 1897 he
constructed a gasoline phaeton, but his subsequent work has been primarily
confined to the electric.
SYLVESTER HAYWOOD ROPER
As early as 1850, Sylvester Haywood Roper, of Roxbury, Mass., began
experimenting with steam for street-vehicle propulsion. In 1882, when he
was seventy-three years of age, he fitted a Columbia bicycle with a
miniature engine, and with this he could run seventy miles on one charge
of fuel. His bicycle weighed one hundred and sixty-five pounds. He
engaged in many track events and his record for three runs of one-third
of a mile each, was forty-two, thirty-nine and thirty-seven seconds.
COPELAND
A tandem tricycle with a vertical boiler and a two-cylinder vertical
engine was built by Copeland, of Philadelphia, in 1882. Kerosene was used
to fire the boiler. It is said that over two hundred of these machines
were built.
G. BOUTON
An ingenious and practical engineer, Bouton made various mechanical
devices, but it is claimed that from a clever toy came the associations
which have resulted in the now famous firm, DeDion-Bouton, with which he
is connected. It is said Compte DeDion saw this toy and on asking for the
maker, met Bouton. Thus came the partnership, in 1882, with Bouton and
Trepardoux. Bouton made a steam tricycle in 1884, containing the
remarkable light and efficient boiler of his invention, which for years
remained the most important contribution of the firm to this art. In 1885
a quadricycle was made, and the success attending the runs made with this,
in which Merrelle co-operated, was such as to bring forth the personal
ideas of DeDion in so strong a manner that Trepardoux and Merrelle severed
their connections with the firm.
The real beginning of the work of this firm was in 1884, and the several
years following saw the production of numerous steam machines, including
phaetons, dog carts, and a variety of other types. Even as late as 1897
heavy steam chars-bancs were made by them, and that year also saw their
well-known thirty-five-passenger, six-wheeled coach, Pauline, on the
streets of Paris--a vehicle which cost over twenty-six thousand francs,
and had a thirty-five horse-power steam tractor. This vehicle had been
preceded by a somewhat similar one constructed in 1893 on the old idea of
a mechanical horse attached to an ordinary 'bus body from which the front
wheels had been removed.
In 1895, DeDion-Bouton produced their first liquid hydro-carbon engine
vehicle--a tricycle with air-cooled motor and dry-battery ignition, which
is so well known to everyone in the industry to-day. These were
manufactured in large numbers, and were followed by larger gasoline
vehicles into which they introduced their engine, namely, a vertical
position. In 1899, their three-passenger, four-wheeled vehicle, and in
1900 a six-passenger vehicle, made good reputations. Since then their
large factory at Putaux, France, well known under the name of
DeDion-Bouton et Cie, has been continually crowded with work on vehicles,
and with the manufacture of their motors which are still sold
independently to other makers in France, as well as in other countries. In
fact the manufacture of engines and parts might be said to be now their
main work.
COUNT A. DEDION
Count DeDion's interest in an ingenious mechanical device constructed by
Bouton, led to his backing the enterprise now so well known under his
name. His activity in the Automobile Club of France, and in all the
sporting events in the past ten years, has in fact brought him into far
more prominence than his associate, Bouton. His interest and energy in
connection with his company are well known, and though the credit for the
mechanical work must undoubtedly be given to Bouton, DeDion is largely
responsible for the great success and general prominence of the company.
ARMAND PEUGEOT
In 1885, and again in 1889, Armand Peugeot, a French inventor and
manufacturer, brought up the subject of automobiles, and in 1889 he began
to manufacture, using the Daimler motor. His first attention having been
given to the motor, he brought out very soon his famous two-parallel
cylinder mounted horizontally on the body frame. Originally of the firm of
Fils de Peugeot, he severed his connection with that firm, and in 1876
formed the Society of Artisans. In 1898, additional factories were erected
at Fives-Lille, and now the concern has works also at Audincourt. The
latter works is claimed to be the most extensive automobile manufacturing
establishment in the world. Peugeot is a member of many learned societies,
was elected an officer of the Academie in 1881, and a Chevalier of the
Legion of Honor in 1889.
RADCLIFFE WARD
Ward commenced his experiments in England about 1886, and built a cab in
1887, which he ran in Brighton with more or less success. A second
vehicle, an omnibus, was built by him and run on the streets in London in
1888, and actually covered, all told, five thousand miles.
MORS
A manufacturer of electrical apparatus, the Mors establishment made a
steam vehicle in 1886, and some ten years later began to manufacture
gasoline vehicles.
MAGNUS VOLK
In 1887, Volk built an electrical dog cart which, like that of Ward, was
seen on the streets of Brighton. The next year he associated himself with
Immisch & Co., and built for the Sultan of Turkey an electrical dog cart.
This was claimed to have a radius of fifty miles at ten miles an hour,
with seven hundred pounds of battery in twenty-four cells, driving the
vehicle by means of a one horse-power motor.
BUTLER
About the same time that Daimler and Benz were at work, Butler, an
Englishman, was studying to make a hydro-carbon engine. He had drawings in
1884 and got out a patent in 1887. He built a tricycle soon after that
date. This had two front wheels as steering wheels and a rear wheel driven
by a two-cylinder engine. But Butler did not carry his plans further, for,
as he wrote in 1890, "the authorities do not countenance its use on roads,
and I have abandoned in consequence any further development of it."
LE BLANT
The steam carriage that Le Blant, of France, built carried nine
passengers, and its weight, fuel and water included, was three and
one-half tons. The engine was three-cylinder horizontal, and the boiler, a
Serpollet instantaneous generator, was placed behind the carriage, the
fireman beside it and the driver in front.
EMILE DELAHAYE
Delahaye, of Tours, associated himself with the firm of Cail in 1870,
spending some years in Belgium, but in 1890 the automobile so attracted
him as to lead him to the construction of his first vehicle. For ten years
he practically adhered to the horizontal engine under the seat, which
construction we find him using in 1900. It is worthy of note that to
Delahaye is given credit for the practical adaptation of the radiator in
the arrangement now generally used in the cooling system.
ROGER
Roger, of Paris, was the French licensee for Benz, taking up that motor
much in the same manner as Panhard & Levassor took up the Daimler. In fact
he had such close relations with Benz as to guide the further development
of both. To this extent he was doubtless largely responsible for
converting Benz to the four-cycle instead of the two-cycle construction,
and he is also credited with having brought about the change from the
vertical crank shaft to the horizontal in the Benz cars. Making good
headway in 1894, he had produced fifty or more machines by 1895, and ran
one in the Paris-Bordeaux race of that year. He brought a car to New York
in 1896, and took part in the Cosmopolitan race, from New York to Ardsley
and return.
GEORGES RICHARD
In 1893, Georges Richard began cycle manufacturing in a small shop and two
years later turned his business into a limited corporation. In 1897, he
began the manufacture of automobiles. His motor is a development of the
Benz, with ignition improvement.
POCHAIN
Pochain, in France, built in 1893 a six-seated phaeton with fifty-four
cells of battery, which would seem to have been practically the first
satisfactory vehicle of its kind.
LOUIS KRIEGER
Early in the nineties of the last century Krieger made an electric
vehicle. About 1894, he introduced his four-passenger hack, converted by
substituting an electric fore carriage for the front axle of an ordinary
vehicle. He has since developed his electric vehicles in the class of city
carriages. A touring car, built for England, called the Powerful, made in
1901 notable records in that country in a long tour through the Isles. The
principal work of Krieger, however, has been in the development of front
drive and steer construction.
DEDETRICH