Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 92.djvu/239

 Motoring on One Wheel

��It's kept upright by means of a gyro- scope and is steered by a gyroscope also

��WHILE gyroscopes have been used to prevent ships from rolling and to keep torpedoes on their courses, it has remained for an Iowa inventor to apply the principle to a one-wheeled automobile to maintain its equilibrium in steering.

In this unusual vehicle, the operator sits above and forward of the center of the wheel, with a one-cylinder gasoline engine at the rear to balance his weight. With the engine behind him, the driver would have to stop every time an ad- justment of the engine parts was necessa- ry, which would not always be convenient. The inventor seems to have neglected to provide some form of folding step to keep the vehicle upright when the gyroscope is not running; but a stand somewhat similar to those used on motorcycles could easily be attached.

The drive from the one-cylinder gaso- line engine to a sprocket on the pneumatic tired wheel is by means of a chain, like that used in motorcycle practice. The vehicle is less flexible than a motorcycle, however, since it has no form of speed-changing mechanism and must rely on a slipping cone clutch or spark and throttle control to give any desired speed changes.

The steering gyro- scope is supported on two bell-crank levers, one on either side of the seat. When it is desired to steer the car to the right, the right-hand lever is pulled backward so that the gyroscope case is lifted up off the left lever support. The precessional movement in evidence will cause the machine to turn to the right until the gyro- scope and its case is allowed to drop so that

���You can swing a - round cor- ners easily on this machine

��Gyroscope steering lever

��Spark control

��Gas control

���The machine has but one wheel, which supports, on four forks, a platform carrying an operator's seat at the front and a one- cylinder motorcycle engine at the rear. The platform houses a balancing gyroscope mount- ed on a vertical shaft and run in vacuum by an electric motor

��it is supported equally on both lever arms. Both gyroscopes are mounted in vacu- um cases, and are driven by current from a small storage battery carried on the frame supporting the seat, and between the seat and the gasoline engine. Whether or not the weight of the storage battery would seriously affect the economy of such a vehicle, and the distance which f,.^f,i,n,= t.nK could be run without

charging the battery, the inventor does not state.

In any event, the in- vention embodies the use of interesting princi- ples. One-wheeled mo- torcycles are always an attractive field for ex- periment and invention. Their number will un- doubtedly increase rapidly.

Imagine the sensation of racing down the road on a one-wheeled vehi- cle! All the world's ahead, only the one wheel's underneath, and a man's free to career and careen as much as he likes — or more! No wonder inventors ex- periment.

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