Popular Science Moitt/il// 



881 



Automobile or Railway Car- 

 Which Is It? 



A CALIFOR- 

 NIA in- 

 ventor has de- 

 vised a method 

 which will en- 

 able an ordinary 

 automobile 

 omnibus to run 

 on railroad rails 

 as well as on 

 city pavements 

 and country 

 roads. It's an 

 old idea, of 

 course, but with 

 modern "im- 

 provements." 

 The Californian 

 bolts a flanged rail- 

 road carwheel and a 

 conventional solid- 

 tired truck wheel 

 together, with the 

 rail wheel on 

 the inside. The 

 circumference of 

 the solid tire 

 wheel is larger than 

 that of the flanged 

 wheel. When run- 

 ning on a pavement 

 of macadam the 

 flanged wheel does 

 not touch the 

 ground at all. It 



comes into action only when the car 

 is running on rails, as shown in the pic- 

 ture. Small wedges, placed alongside the 

 track, permit the 

 omnibus to run on 

 or off the rails with- 

 out difficulty. The 

 system has been 

 tried out on a sub- 

 urban bus-line in 

 California and has 

 given good satis- 

 faction. It enabled 

 a California motor- 

 bus company to 

 open up new terri- 

 tory between Holt- 

 ville and El Centro, 

 between which 



there was no suitable road but a slightly 

 used railway line. The bus picks up 

 its passengers on the city streets and 



then runs to 

 the railroad line 

 over which it 

 makes its trips. 

 It will probably 

 add a new word 

 to the diction- 

 ary when some 

 philologist shall 

 succeed in con- 

 structing a term 

 that fits this 

 du al-service 

 car. " Autorail 

 Car," for in- 

 stance, or some 

 other suitable 

 combining form indic- 

 ative of the car's 

 ability to change its 

 nature at the will of its 

 chauffeur or engineer, 

 whichever title may be 

 the proper one. 



The wheels of this omnibus will run 

 smoothly on ordinary railroad rails, 

 city pavements or country roads 



Sidecar arrangement which is decidedly use- 

 ful for the delivery of crated motorcycles 



Extending the Use 

 of the Sidecar 



MOTORCYCLE 

 dealer in River- 

 side, California, finds 

 the sidecar arrange- 

 ment improvised by 

 him to change ordi- 

 nary motorcycles into 

 delivery trucks very useful in his own 

 business to carry crated motorcycles 

 from the nearest distributing point, 

 Los Angeles, to 

 Riverside, * a dis- 

 tance of fifty miles. 

 The trip to Los 

 Angeles and return 

 is made in four 

 hours and requires 

 about fifty cents' 

 worth of fuel, while 

 the railroad freight 

 on the crated ma- 

 chine would cost 

 $2.50, and delivery 

 could not be ex- 

 pected in less than 

 three or four days. 



