ENDLESS RAILS. 



771 



(say), j, which contrasts favourably with the expenses of an ordinary one 

 horse vehicle." 



ENDLESS RAILS. 



These adjuncts to locomotion can be adapted to any kind of vehicle, and 

 are in pieces about two feet long, articulated, and resting upon a base to give 

 the necessary stability. The endless rail entirely envelopes the wheels all 

 along the train, and the right and left rails are quite independent of each 

 other, and as the vehicles advance the rails are put down and raised again 

 when the carnages have passed. In front there are two distributing wheels 

 governed by the tractive power, so that as the engine, or the animal drawing 

 the train turns aside, the rails are still laid down parallel as before, but the 

 hind wheels will not permit of very sharp curves. 



There are wheels also at the rear of the train, and as on curves one 

 wheel will pass over more rail than another, and in the hinder wheels a 

 differential arrangement is used, and when one goes back the other advances 



Fig. 903. Endless rails. 



as much, and so the relative distance is kept up, for the rail does not alter 

 in length at all. The wheels have double flanges to retain them on the line. 



The system, considered from a mechanical point of view, gives striking 

 results, and very little effort is required to put the train in motion. The 

 resistance is very small, and much greater weights can, of course, be trans- 

 ported upon the endless rail than upon the ordinary road. 



The experiment has been tried in the Tuilleries Gardens in Paris. 

 Three carriages filled with children are drawn by two goats without any 

 fatigue, and in the ordinary goat carriages at least twelve of the animals 

 would be necessary that is, four to each carriage. The economy of this 

 mode of transport is therefore incontestable. The usual rate is about three- 

 and-a-half to four miles an hour, so it is not adapted for travellers, but for 

 merchandise. 



The system might be applied to numerous vehicles on all kinds of roads 

 for horses and oxen, in mines and factories, and in colonial plantations. 

 M. Ader, the inventor, intended the system to be applied in the Landes, 

 where the rails would lie close upon the sandy soil, and the expense of 

 " metalling " roads would be entirely done away with. The adoption of the 

 endless rail method of conveyance would prove a fortune to the Landes, where 



