June 1897 From Locomotive Engineering

A New Experience with Electric Traction on a Steam Road.

On the Moth of May an experimental was - made on a branch of the New York, New Haven & Hartford Railroad which, it seems to the writer, marks a distinct step in advance •in the handling of suburban traffic.

The New York, New Haven & Hartford Railroad, through the enterprise of its president, Mr. Clark, has taken up the subject of the handling of suburban traffic by electricity a little more enthusiastically than most roads. Mr. Clark apparently recognizes the fact that electricity is here and must be dealt with, and it seems to be his policy to own and control the feeding and competing lines of electric roads that cross or parallel the New Haven Last summer the Nantucket Beach road —which is purely a summer affair and runs three months in the year was equipped with a trolley. They employed, however, large cars—full-sized coaches'- This line was very successful as far as it went

Believing in the superiority of the third-rail system over the trolley, the New Haven people put down an experimental piece of third rail, about a mile long, the end of the Nantucket road. This worked successfully enough during a few trials to encourage them to try something larger.

During this past winter they have built at Berlin. Conn., a very large power-house and have laid a third rail on the line of the steam road from there to New Britain, a distance of three miles, and from New Britain to the city of Hartford, a distance of nine miles, over the old New England Railroad.

This third rail is constructed in such shape that it sheds water. It is more or less oval on top and concave underneath. It practically rests on the ties, small wooden blocks only holding it up one inch, and is without other insulation. This is . Something that the electricians all said could not be successfully done. The fact of the matter is that dry wood is a very good non-conductor, but what the leakage on such a line as this will be in wet weather and winter, remains to be seen; but from experiments so far it seems that it will not be nearly so great as was anticipated

One of the chief obstacles always urged against the handling of suburban business of a heavy character by electricity has been the belief of electricians and railroad men as well, that it was practically impossible to send a current strong enough to run big motors at a distance five or six miles without heavy and expensive feeders along the line at intervals. This the New Haven people have proven to be not altogether true. On the twelve-mile line just mentioned, they simply connect the third rail directly with the generator at the powerhouse, and there is no feeding whatever except through the third rail, which, of course, is very large and can carry a large current.

The cars have cast-iron shoes underneath, which rub on the rail, and are equipped with air brakes, the air being pumped by an electric pump. Each platform of the car is equipped with the controlling apparatus of the motors, the airbrake, whistle and gong-bell.

On May lath an invited party of railroad men, numbering about seventy-five, was taken over this line, although the whole structure from the power-house to the track equipment was in a half- state. It is only fair to say, however, that the trip was entirely successful; that the cars fully loaded will accelerate very quickly, and would probably get into a speed of fifty miles an hour in a quarter the distance that would be required by

'Locomotive and one car. A speed of sixty miles an hour was easily obtainable and was obtained, but numerous grade crossings prevented a continuous run at high speed.   The trip from New Britain to Hartford, nine miles, was made in I3J/2 minutes from start to stop.

May be that all this does not mean a great deal, but it seems to the writer that it does. In the first place, it is the firs;

Experiment of any magnitude where direct current without feeders has handled heavy traffic for as great a distance as twelve miles; in the second place, it demonstrates that one the great advantages of the electric car over the locomotive is the speedy acceleration, and in the third place, it is the first instance in this country where the electric motor has taken the place of steam engines on their own track. It may be that the cost of doing business in this way will be greater than by locomotives, but it looks very doubtful. It may be that the leakage from this unprotected rail in bad weather will cost an awful lot of coal at the powerhouse.

It may be that the bond between the rail joints, which is now made of copper cables bolted to the iron rail, will in time corrode; it is altogether likely that it will, and, as is well known to mechanics, all oxides are very good non-conductors, and this will make the resistance on the line very great.

It is perhaps greatly v> me advantage of the science of railroading that Mr. dark and his associates were not deterred by opinions as to what this or that would do under the circumstances, but after making some rough preliminary experiment' they showed that they could do certain things that have been deemed quite impossible, and have done them on a scale that will demonstrate their practicability or utter impracticability.

It seems to the writer that the greatest difficulty that lies in the way of the use of the third rail is the danger of connecting this rail with one of the other rails of tlie track, forming an arc that is very dangerous. This was demonstrated with a little firework, at a switch when coming out of the New Britain yards. These cars are equipped with iron pilots, the

Same as locomotives, and in leaving the yard the forward end of the car was raised on the inclined track and the back end was depressed enough to let tlie bottom of this pilot rest for an instant on the third rail and one of the other rails, making a great deal of noise and showing a lot of blue file .In fact, it a piece of iron, like 'a crow-bar, was left on these rails, the bar itself would be melted down at the point of contact, and the flames would be very fierce and very dangerous. Just think of the possibilities of such an act on the pull of a trackman, or the Fourh-of-July display that would follow if a farmer allowed a chain in drag behind his wagon in crossing the tracks. The only safe way for an affair of this kind to be conducted would be to put the third rail only on the company's absolute right of way, where. By no possible means, could anything get to it.

But this is only one of the small objections. This rail, or its equivalent, might be made into a trolley, overhead, and be comparatively safe. The important point is that this work has been done by electricity, done well, and. for some reasons, done a good deal better than it can be done by locomotives.

It would seem that the use of electricity tor heavy suburban traffic. Of out large cities, and the to give for running small, frequent units at good speeds would give it advantages over tile ordinary suburban train- For the same expenditure of power and labor, much

More frequent service could be given, no heavy locomotive is pounding' over the track carrying its load of water and coal, and the fuel used to do the work could be

Of much cheaper quality and used under boilers possessing tlie highest advantages and with condensing engines using steam the most economically.

But the plan of using electricity i trunk line business, or for any heavy service such as is ordinarily found on. American railroads, seems to the writer to be just as far away as ever.

It is all right for a car or two, but has no business—in its present shape—with trains.