United States Patent Office. 



CHARLES E. DURYEA, OF PEORIA, ILLINOIS. 

 ROAD-VEHICLE. 



SPECIFICATION forming part of Letters Patent No. 540,648, dated June 11, i 895. 



Application filed April 30, 1884. Serial No. 509,466. (No moM.) 



To all whoti it may concern: 



Be it known that I, Charles E. Duryea, a 

 citizen of the United States, residing at Peoria, 

 in the county of Peoria and State of Illiuois, 

 S have invented new and useful Improvements 

 in Road- Vehicles, of which the following is a 

 specification. 



The object of this'invention is to produce a 

 road vehicle which shall be self-propelled, not 



io unduly heavy, simple and easy of control aud 

 comparatively inexpensive, together with 

 such minor objects as will become hereinaf- 

 ter apparent. 

 _ The invention more particularly relates to 



IS the construction aud arrangement of parts for 

 constituting the driving gearing and to the 

 means for controlling the action thereof; to 

 an improved manner of raountidg the front, 

 or steering, wheels upon tire front axle, and 



20 of mounting the said axle relative to the run- 

 ning gear frame, and to the means for effeet- 

 ingthesteering; to the appliances forthesup- 

 port of the motor aud driviug mechanism in 

 an advantageous and efficient manner, and, 



25 generally, to improved and simplified details 

 of construction throughout the vehicle, alias 

 will hereinafter be rendered more apparent, 

 and the invention consists in constructions 

 and combinations of parts, all substantially 



33 as will hereinafter fully appear and be set 

 forth in the claims. 



Reference is to be had to the accompanying 

 drawings, in which— 



Figure 1 is a sectional elevation from front 



35 to rear of the improved road-vehicle. Fig. 2 is 

 a plan view of the running and driving gear, 

 the vehicle-body being understood as removed. 

 Fig. 3 is a front elevation of the vehicle. Fig. 

 4 is a perspective view of the support and ?us- 



40 pension devices for the driving mechanism. 

 Fig. 5 is a vertical sectional view, longitudi- 

 nally, through the shiftable driving-gear, the 

 controlling devices employed in conjunction 

 with this mechanism being seen in side ele- 



45 vation. Figs. G and 7 show the above-men- 

 tioned controlling devicesas in operative re- 

 lations differing the one from the other and 

 also from that of Fig. 5. 

 Similar letters of reference indicate corre- 



50 sponding parte in all of the views. 



The parts will now be described in detail 

 with reference to said drawings, and A rep- 



resents the body which is spring supported 

 on the frame, B, of the running gear. This 

 frame, as shown, is rectangular, and has the 

 body-supporting springs, B 2 , similar to those 

 found in common carriages. This frame has, 

 affixed thereto, at its rear ends, sleeves, a, a, 

 which loosely embrace the rear wheel axle, D, 

 which is the driven axle of the vehicle. The 

 axle, E, for the front wheels is centrally se- 

 cured to the running gear frame, B, by the 

 horizontal king-bolt, b, whereby such axle 

 may have a swinging movement relative to 

 the frame in a vertical plane, but it has no 

 swinging movement horizontally, the wheels 

 being swivel-mounted on the ends of this axle 

 peculiarly, as will shortly hereinafter be set 

 forth. 



The body, as shown, is in the form of an 

 inverted box, the motor, II, and driving gear 

 being accommodated within the downwardly 

 opening iuclosure constituted thereby, and 

 the body also has the upwardly open box-like 

 forward extension, or pit, A 2 , for the accom- 

 modation of the feet of the rider, the rider's 

 seat being cqastUuted by the top forward por- 

 tion of the box body. Some other suitable 

 design of body may, of course, be used in lieu 

 of this one shown. 



The front wheels, d, d, are hung to the front 

 axle, E, so that the center of each wheel base 

 is in a line coincident with the axis of the pi v- 

 otal connection which isprovided between the 

 journals for the wheels and the axle,. which 

 arrangement practically destroys any tend- 

 ency to deflection from the course that might 

 otherwise arise from striking an obstacle, 

 and so renders the steering easier. In order 

 to effect this the axle is formed with yoked 

 ends, the yoke members, /, /, being above and 

 below the longitudinal Hue of the axle. The 

 short journal, g, showu for eaoh wheel, has at 

 its inner end an upwardly and downwardly 

 extended arm, h, which is return-bent to be 

 loosely embraced by the axle 3'oke,/,/. The 

 cone pointed screws, c, passed through the 

 yoke members,/,and into sockets therefor in 

 the arms, h, of the journals, g, constitute the 

 means for the swivel connection between said 

 parts. The lock-nuts, c 2 , manifestly, are em- 

 ployed with utility in this connection. 



It will be perceived that inasmuch asln the 

 arrangement shown, the pivotal connections 



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BULLETIN 240: CONTRIBUTIONS FROM THE MUSEUM OF HISTORY AND TECHNOLOGY 



