Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 88.djvu/889

 Popular Science Monthly

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���Map showing cableway. Note the small portion which extends over New York State

��counterweight box, arranged in steel guides similar to the track-cable counter- weights. This creates a tension which adjusts any slack caused by the rising and falling of the car. At San Sebastian the car holds only fourteen passengers, but at Niagara seats are provided for twenty-four passengers and standing room in a raised aisle for twenty-one more besides the conductor.

The engineers have determin- ed to a nicety what would happen to the car if the trac- tion cable were to break. As the two termi- nals are nearly at the same height above the river level, one being 249.5 ft.andtheother, 246.5 ft., they figure that the car would run backwards and forwards along the track cables until it came gently to rest at the lowest point of the sag of the cable, which would be about the center of the span or directly over New York State. A light basket which holds one man and which hangs from pulleys which can be readily thrown over two of the track cables, would be used in the rescue work. The emergency man would attach a re- lief cable to the marooned car, and an auxiliary engine installed for the purpose would pull the car back to Thompson's Point.

Some Interesting Safety Devices

There are several safety devices of ingenious construction, among the num- ber being an automatic control stop which halts the car within three feet of the concrete station. A clamp on the car strikes the face of the control stop, prevents the car from traveling farther, and then engages with it in such a manner that the car cannot slip back from the landing platform. Further- more, the car gates cannot be opened until the clamp has engaged with the control stop, and even then only the

��right gates can be opened. In addition to this, there are limit switches which prevent the power from being turned on again, and thus jam the car against the station once the power has been shut off. To string the cables across the Whirlpool the traction and track towers and sheaves were first erected. Then a long rope was carried around the face of

the cliff from

Colt's Point to Thompson's Point. When this was pulled taut a wire rope was hauled across with the aid of a hoist- ing engine, and then the trac- tion cable was pulled into place. This cable was used to haul the track cables across. The trip from from point to point can be made in about five minutes. To test the car cast-iron bars weighing thirty nine thou- sand and nineteen pounds, or three times the working load of the car with forty to fort3'-five passengers, were dis- tributed on the floor. A trestle was built and the car was suspended by its wheels from it. The test was satisfac- torilv met.

��Inventions for the Navy

LAST July, Secretary of the Navy -/ Josephus Daniels announced the creation of a board, afterwards desig- nated as the Naval Consulting Board, headed by Thomas A. Edison, for the purpose of aiding in the development of the Navy and the defense of the nation, by giving expert consideration to the many needs of the Navy and the many in\entions that might be sub- mitted to it. Public announcement of the creation of this board was accom- panied by an invitation from the Navy Department to the in\entors of the country to submit their ideas.

Seven months later, not less than five thousand inventions, ideas and sugges- tions had been received.

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