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[Entered at the Posi-Offlce of New York, N.Y,, as Second-Class Matter.J 



A WEEKLY NEWSPAPER OF ALL THE ARTS AND SCIENCES. 



Eighth Yeab. 

 Vol. XV. No. 371. 



NEW YOEK, March 14, 1890. 



Single Copies, Ten Cents. 

 3.50 Peb Year, in Advance. 



A NEW ELECTRIC TRAJS^SFER-TABLE. 



Wb illustrate on this page an electric transfer-table, recently 

 installed by the Sprague Electric Railway and Motor Company 

 for the New York Central and Hudson River Railroad. This 

 table differs from the earlier ones installed by the same com- 

 pany chiefly in the electric motor, which is of fifteen horse- 

 power instead of seven and a half, and also in the contact 

 arrangement. The contact is obtained from a couple of heavy 

 copper wires stretched about three feet apart over the second of 



Company, there is an overhead contact. The current used is 

 only 330 volts, and hence, while not wholly pleasant to take 

 in one's body, it is in no way dangerous. The current is 

 taken from the same dynamo that furnishes light for the sta- 

 tion. The full current capacity of the table-motor is 6ft 

 amperes. 



The speed of the electric motor is governed by a switch, 

 which throw the winding of the field into different combina- 

 tions, thus altering the current, maintaining a practically con- 

 stant strength of field without the use of any wasteful resist- 



RAILROAD TRANSFER-TABLE OPERATED BY AN ELECTRIC MOTOR. 



the four parallel tracks, the wire being carried on insulators 

 fixed to light cast-iron cross-beams so as to be a few inches 

 above the rails. The conductors are kept taut under all changes 

 of temperature by springs at one end. Over these wires two 

 contact rollers travel beneath the table, being kept in contact 

 by gravity only. In the Altoona electric transfer-table, 

 installed by the same company for the Chicago, Burlington, and 

 Quincy Railroad, there is an outer contact maintained by 

 springs, while at the Waukesha electric transfer-table, installed 

 by the Sprague Company for the Wisconsin Central Railroad 



ance. The control over the speed of the motor is perfect^ 

 and no complicated nest of gearing for changing speed is 

 required. 



The motor is supported at one end, according to the regular 

 Sprague method, by double compression springs playing upon' 

 a bolt which rests upon the platform of the transfer- table. 

 This method has been developed in street-railway work and 

 other places where it is desirable to start slowly under a heavy- 

 load, and has proved very satisfactory. At the other end the- 

 motor is sleeved to a rigid support. By means of this flexible- 



