The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1891-11-04
TO PUT ON MOTOR CARS.
THE C. AND S. UNDECIDED WHAT
SYSTEM IT WILL ADOPT

Pres dent Johnston's Investigations
Convention IN Plttsourg-The Sys-
TENS of Electric Motors Coming
Most Into Use-The Storage System
as Far on as 1t Ever Wss-The Gear
less Motor Coming Lotto General
Use.
President ]. II. Johnston. of the City and
Suburban railway, has just returned from
Pitrsburg, where ne attended the tenth an-
nual meeting of the American Street Rail
way Association. He expressed himself
yesterday as pleased with the results OF the
meeting and his visit generally.
The chief purpose of Capt. Johnston's
visit was to study the latest improvements
in the electrical railway service, ana to
thoroughly post himself upon the electric
systems Of the various manufacturers with
view to the change from horse power to
electricity, which 1t is intended to make
upon the City and Suburban.
THE MARCH OF INVENTION.
Special attention was devoted by the con-
vention to improvements in electric rails
ways, and the merits OF the inventions were
fully disc used. Pittsourg itself proved to
be the most complete exposition OF the cleo
trio railway system. as it is
a town of steep hills and
sharp curves and it has nothing but electric
railways. In fact it would be almost impos.
sinle for horses to pull the cars up the steep
hills
Capt. Johnston says the discussions be-
fore the association brought out several
things very plainly. The perfection of the
storage battery system, the ideal of the
electric railway service, appears as far dis
tant as ever, and the present overhead troll
ley system will probably continue for years
to come.
EDIsoN'S ALLEGED DISCOVERY.
Edison was said to have perfected such a
system a short while ago, but his
representative at the meeting said
that such an accomplishment Is still in the
dim and distant future, and that he did not
anticipate such result in fifteen years at
least.
Another thing was that the double reduc-
ton system, introduced about three years
ago, had been superseded By the more sim
pie and more satisfactory single reduction
system. This In turn is threatened with
being superseded by the goarless
motor, which is, as It's name
implies, simpler still and less likely to get
out Of order The gearless motor also has
the advantage of being entirely covered by
an iron box, which protects the machinery
from dust. mud aud water. The chief OBJ
tections to the gearless motor are that it is
new and untried, comparatively, and very
heavy.
THE FAvoRITE SYSTEM NOW.
The single induction system, Capt. John
ston says, is the general favori;e. The Edi-
son, Westinghouse, Ihomson-Houstona and
other large companies are now mauufactur-.
ing both systems and are confident OF their
entire perfection i'll a short while.
AS an instance of the wonderful advance
in the manufacture of electric car mo-
tors it may be mentioned that
motors that were worth thousands of
dollars few years ago are now valuable
only as old junk, having been entirely
superseded by later inventions
Capt. Johnston said that the City and
Suburban will adopt either the gearless or
this single induction system.
II the gearless system succeeds the COM
pany will adopt that, but if it fails the
single induction system will be adopted.
There we're a number of inventors aud
manufacturers before the association with
wonderful Improvements which they had
made, but none Of them had ever been
proved and consequently nobody cared to
ia ke old of them