MECHANICS AND USEFUL AKTS. 35 



WOODEN WHEELS. 



Mansells' patent wheels for railway carriages are fiist coming 

 into general use. They have already been adopted by the Lon- 

 don, and North-Western, Great Western, Midland, Great North- 

 ern, Great Eastern, Metropolitan, and other English lines, and 

 the Imperial Government has sanctioned their adoption on all the 

 railways of Russia. It may not be generally known that Man- 

 sells' original patent was for securing the tire to the wheel by re- 

 taining rings, the fillets of which are turned to fit into corre- 

 sponding grooves in the tires. The whole is secured by nuts and 

 bolts. Between the tire and the boss spokes are dispensed with 

 b}' the insertion of stout, close-fitting panels of East India teak- 

 wood, the oily nature of which preserves from oxidation the iron 

 passing through it. For this purpose teak is superior to any other 

 wood, and it has further the advantage of never shrinking. The 

 superiority of these wheels over iron ones is well known to all 

 observant travellers, their special merits being absence of jarring, 

 and also of noise. — Van Nostrand''s Magazine^ Sept., 1869. 



NEW RAIL-LEVELLING DEVICE. 



The ordinary lever-bar used for lifting rails and sleepers in con- 

 structing and repairing the permanent way of railways involves 

 in its operation the labor of several men. To obviate this, an 

 English engineer, Mr. De Bergue, has constructed a simple and 

 compact tool, composed of a kind of shoe combined with a bar 

 pivoted at one end, and at the other furnished with a screw by 

 which it may be raised relatively to the shoe. The instrument 

 with its bar depressed is thrust under the rail or sleeper to be 

 raised, and the screw is turned until the bar has been forced up- 

 wards sufficiently to bring the superincumbent parts to the re- 

 quired position. Those portions of the apparatus subjected to 

 heavy strains are made of steel, and the working surfaces are 

 hardened so that it cannot easily get out of repair. — Van Nos- 

 irancfs Eclectic Engineering Magazine. 



THE FAIRLIE STEAM CARRIAGE. 



The name of Mr. Robert F. Fairliehas fpr some time past been 

 brought prominently before the public in connection with the 

 economical working of railways. A trial of this carriage was 

 made July 15, at the Hatcham Iron Works, which successfully 

 demonstrated the practicability of working the system upon rail- 

 ways with curves of only 50 feet radius. The steam carriage ex- 

 hibited, and which was not quite completed, was designed to 

 work on a metropolitan railway, at the terminal stations of which 

 sufficient space could not be given for laying down rails on a curve 

 of 25 feet radius for the standard carriage to run itself round ; 

 consequently the standard carriage had to be altered in dimen- 



