Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 91.djvu/108

 Can the Railway Train Be Made Noiseless?

"Yes," say the inventors, "by improving the wheels." "No," say the engineers, "unless you perfect the road-beds"

By Marius C. Krarup

wheel among those illustrated, it is well to remember that flexibility makes a constant demand on the power of the locomotive. In the Kinsman wheel the main object of inserting a non- metallic substance is to insulate the wheel and the car from the rail elec- trically, this being a requirement in some forms of electric railway service, and this represents a new angle of the subject having little to do with the other efforts. The Lindblad wheel, on the other hand, is a cushioned and anti- noise wheel with special wiring to pre- vent it from becoming non-conductive. The most radical and effi- cient method for securing comparatively noiseless op- eration as well as saving of road-bed and rolling stock, according to modern traffic engineers, comprises thor- ough grading, draining and ballasting of the road-bed, smooth hard rails of ample dimensions, manganese steel rails at crossings, frogs and improved design of switches, accurately con- insuutio* centric wheels and car springs with well damped flexible pad' and governed -rebound.

At left above, the Lindblad wheel; These would reduce noise at right above, the Kinsman wheel and improve the service.

���The Maginn wheel is built up in sections secured together by bolts or rivets for flexibility

THE idea of producing a noiseless rail wheel, and even making it distinct ly flexible to reduce the wear and tear of the roll- ing stock has seemed a good one to some in- ventive minds, and they have proceeded to patent their con- ceptions. These are all char- acterized by a noise-deadening and more or less elastic sub- stance which is inserted between the flanged rim and the hub portion of the wheel; by some provision to prevent the rim from slipping round on the inserted material, and by guide plates on the sides to hold the hub and rim in aline- ment. The details can be followed without difficulty in the accompanying illustrations but are subordinate in interest to. the question whether the whole plan is practicable. It is next to impossible to make the "built-up" wheel as cheap or as strong as the one- piece construction. It is almost hope- less to try to introduce a wheel which is after all only a little less noisy than those in use, unless it pays for itself from the start through savings in other directions. If the wheel is frankly intended to be flexible, as the Maginn

����The Madden sound-deadening wheel also has a flexible pad which fits like a lining around its rim

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