Patent GB-190218637-A (GB)
Title: A New or Improved Electric Post being a Method of and Means for the Collection, Transmission, and Distribution of Letters, Parcels and the like.
Inventor: PISCICELLI ROBERTO TAEGGI
Filed: 1902-08-25
Granted: 1903-08-25
Abstract: 18,637. Piscicelli, Count R. Taeggi-. Aug. 25. Stopping and starting engines and trains.-Relates to a method of and means for. the collection and transmission of letters, parcels, and the like, comprising a complete overhead electric railway worked on a three-phase alternating- current system, with auto. matic block and switch arrangements. The lines are divided up into sections separately supplied with lowtension three-phase currents from transformers placed along the route and fed with high tension threephase current by means of continuous conductors. Each line consists of two upper and two lower wires 8, 9, Figs. 11 and 12, on which the vehicles run, three serving for conveying the driving current to the motor on the vehicle, and the fourth serving for a current controlling the automatic block system. The sections near a station are normally deprived of current, and are inclined upwardly towards the station, so as to check the speed of an entering vehicle and assist the starting of a departing one. Fig. 6 is a diagram showing several sections of a main line 4, and illustrating the automatic block system. Each vehicle has a roller 21, or two rollers in electrical connection with one another, resting on, and connecting, the two lower wires 9. One of these wires, as mentioned above, is not in the main driving circuit, but in a circuit fed by one phase of the transformer 16 of the preceding section and including an electromagnetic interrupter 25, which acts to cut out of the driving circuit of the preceding section the two wires 8 on which the main running wheels of the vehicle rest, so that, if a vehicle is stopped on any section, it cuts out the preceding section, and any following vehicle entering it is thus brought to rest. Indicators are provided to show whether or not the interrupters are in action. To check the speed of the vehicles as they approach switches or points, two of the three main conductors are interrupted for a space, so as to deprive the motor of current. To prevent collision between two vehicles approaching a set of points at the same time, one on the main line, and the other on a branch, the electromagnets 25, 25' of the automatic block system for the two sections preceding the switch are connected in series, so that both sections are deprived of current whenever a vehicle leaves either of them for the sections including the points. These latter sections are moreover made of different lengths for the main line and the branch respectively so that, if two vehicles enter them simultaneously, they will not reach the points at the same instant. In cases where the branch line is short it will be sufficient to have an electric indicator, at the station at the end of the branch, in circuit with the section cf the main line preceding the points, so as to show when a vehicle is on that section. The collecting-vehicles are brought to rest by means of stop blocks 85, Fig. 18, raised in the path of the wheels by counterweighted levers. They are prevented from running back by spring detents 86 which rise behind the back wheels. The stops are automatically withdrawn by the letter box as it descends after having discharged its contents, and the vehicle is restarted by the inclination of the track, aided by counterweighted levers 101 which are released to push the back axle, by the same mechanism that withdraws the stops. This mechanism consists of a rock shaft 91, with weighted arms, turned by rope connection to a tappet lever struck by the letter box. The rock shaft carries winding pulleys for withdrawing the stop blocks, and wheels with recesses to receive the tail ends of the starting levers 101, so as to allow them to rise. For stopping the vehicles at stations, weighted brake beams 183, Fig. 42, are employed, between which and fixed rails 190, forming continuations of the line-wires, the wheels are gripped. The speed has previously been checked by cutting off the driving current near the stations. The vehicle is released by raising the lever 188, and runs down a slight incline into an emptying room. It is started from the station on an incline on the withdrawal of stop blocks similar to those described in connection with the letter-box poles.