SYLPH CYCLES SSS- 



Figure 5. — Advertisement of Duryea 

 bicycle company, Scientific American, 



September g, 1893. 



powered carriages he had read of earlier came con- 

 stantly into his mind in these periods of idleness. 4 

 He and Frank studied several books on gasoline engines, 

 among them one by an English writer (title and author 

 now unknown); 5 this described the Otto 4-stroke 

 cycle as now used. Some engineers, however, were 

 concerned because this engine, on the completion of 

 the exhaust stroke, had not entirely evacuated all of 

 the products of combustion. The Atkinson engine, 

 patented in 1887, was one of the attempts to solve 

 this as well as several other problems, thus creating a 

 more efficient cycle. This engine was designed so 

 that the exhaust stroke carried the piston all the way 

 to the head of the engine, while the compression 

 stroke only moved the piston far enough to sufficiently 

 compress the mixture. The unusual linkage necessary 

 to create these unequal strokes in the Atkinson engine 

 made it seem impractical for a carriage engine, where 

 compactness was desired. 



Going to Hartford, Connecticut, possibly on 

 business relating to his bicycle work, Charles visited 

 the Hartford Machine Screw Company where the 

 Daimler-type engine was being produced, 6 but after 

 examining it he felt it was too heavy and clumsy for 

 his purpose. Also in Hartford he talked over the 

 problem of a satisfactory engine with C. E. Hawley, 

 an employee of the Pope Manufacturing Company, 

 makers of the Columbia bicycle. Hawley, searching 

 for a way to construct an engine that would perform 

 in a manner similar to the Atkinson, yet would have 

 the lightness and compactness necessary for a carriage 

 engine, suggested an idea that Charles believed had 

 some merit. This idea, involving the use of what the 



Figure 6. — J. Frank Duryea. about 1894, 

 as drawn by George Giguere from a photo- 

 graph. (Smithsonian photo 48335.) 



Duryeas later called a "free piston," was eventually 

 to be incorporated in their first engine." 



Construction Begins 



Back in Chicopee again, Charles began planning 

 his first horseless carriage. Frank later stated that 

 they leaned heavily on the Benz patents in their work; 8 

 but while the later engine and transmission show evi- 

 dence of this, only the Benz manner of placing the 

 engine and the flywheel seem to have been employed 

 in the original Duryea plan. Charles reversed the en- 

 gine so that the flywheel was to the front, rather than 

 to the rear as in the Benz patent, but made use of Benz' 

 vertical crankshaft so that the flywheel rotated 

 in a horizontal plane. Previously most engines had 

 used vertical flywheels; Benz, believing that this prac- 

 tice would cause difficulty in steering a propelled 



* Charles Duryea's statement to Springfield Daily Republican, 

 April 14, 1937. 



5 Frank Duryea, America's First Automobile (Springfii Id, Mass.: 

 Donald Macaulay, 1942), p. 4. 



"Letter from Charles Duryea to Alfred Reeves, March 25, 

 1920; copy in Museum files. 



7 History notes dictated by Charles E. Duryea in the office 

 of David Beecroft, editor of Automobile Trade Journal, on 

 January 10, 1925. Copy in Museum files. Hereinafter, 

 these notes are referred to as "history." 



8 Frank Duryea in statement made to the Senate Committee 

 on Public Administration of Massachusetts, February 9, 1952. 



BULLETIN 240: CONTRIBUTIONS FROM THE MUSEUM OF HISTORY AND TECHNOLOGY 



