A Street Cleaner Built Like a Carpet Sweeper 



Cleaning two hundred thousand square 

 yards of pavement in eight hours 



Nozzle 



THE motor-driven vacuum street clean- 

 er shown in the accompanying illus- 

 tration is built on exactly the same 

 principle as that of the ordinary household 

 carpet sweeper. It 

 differs from others 

 of a similar type 

 in that every par- 

 ticle of the dust 

 and dirt picked up 

 is retained in the 

 vehicle storage 

 bin. This is ac- 

 complished by 

 passing the air 

 sucked up with 

 the dust 

 through a 

 water seal. 

 The passage 

 of the dust- 

 1 ad en air 

 through the 

 seal filters it 

 so that when 

 expelled from 

 the apparatus 

 it is clean and 

 pure just like 

 the outer air 

 after a rain 

 storm. 



The vehicle is entirely self-contained. It 

 sweeps the street, picks up the dust and 

 dirt, deposits it automatically in its storage 

 bin and can finally run to the point of dis- 

 posal or have its load of sweepings trans- 

 ferred to other vehicles to conserve its own 

 time for the cleaning operation. 



While the sweeping and picking up oh he 

 load is entirely automatic, the method em- 

 ployed is very simple. The apparatus con- 

 sists of a conventional motor truck chassis 

 on which are mounted a two-part storage 

 bin, a blower driven by a separate gasoline 

 engine and a header or funnel-shaped pas- 

 sageway by means of which the dirt is 

 sucked up off the ground and transferred 

 to the blower from whence it is forced in 

 the two-part bin. 



The blower and its direct-connected gas 

 engine are mounted transversely of. the 

 frame directly behind the driver's seat un- 



der a light metal cover. At the bottom 

 the funnel-shaped header spreads out into 

 a long suction box in close contact with the 

 ground and supported on chains for raising 

 or lowering as required. Air and dirt on 

 the street are sucked through this header 



Cleaned-outairtc Almost clean* into the Center of the 



atmosphere outoftopbm blower as the latter IS 



Rear door for revolved. It 



is thrown out 

 at the peri- 

 phery of the 

 blower into a 

 rectangular 

 pipe leadingto 

 the top of the 

 storage bin. 

 The latter is 

 divided into 

 two parts by 

 a horizontal 

 partition. 



As the air 

 enters the top 

 portion it 

 swirls around 

 and deposits 

 the greater 

 portion of the 

 dirt on the 

 bottom of the 

 upper com- 

 partment. The air is then drawn out and 

 carried down into a small bottomless pan 

 with its lower edges below the surface of 

 several inches of water in the lower compart- 

 ment. The partly-cleaned air has to pass 

 down through the water and up on the out- 

 side of the pan before it is led to a pipe open 

 to the atmosphere directly aft of the driver's 

 seat on the side opposite the blower. The 

 air is thus washed and freed of its dust 

 before it is allowed to escape. The dirt 

 collected is taken out through doors in 

 each compartment at the rear. 



This type of cleaner prevents the scat- 

 tering of dust through the air and is 

 cheaper and quicker than the old hand 

 method or the broom and flushing method. 

 It will clean two hundred thousand square 

 yards of pavement in eight hours. Another 

 advantage is that it does not make the 

 streets slippery as does the water flushing. 



The street-cleaner motor truck 

 consists of a two-part bin, a 

 blower, and a funnel shaped 

 passageway through which dirt 

 is sucked in. At left is shown a 

 section of the brush and its nozzle 



203 



