Rock Island daily Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1886-1893, 1893-01-12
STREET SWEEPING.
The Various Machines and How they Work
Attempts at improvements.

The Various Machines and How they Work
Attempts at improvements.
Tee Chicago Daily News has the fol-
lowing concerning street sweeping de-
vices. a matter to which the Rock Island
council has given more or less attention
Of late. having recently determined to
Try the m n with broom scheme as an
experiment the coming season.
To the average citizen the street.
sweeping machine is an object of aver
sion and the cause of more or less pro
faulty. II comes swishing along just as
he is going out for the evening and kicks
up q cloud OF dust which settles on his
new silk hat anG fills his eyes and mouth
with the sediment Of city life and traffic.
The sweeping m 4chlne, how, yer. is the
result OF good deal of careful designing
| and inventing. and luckless inventors are
all the time spending their time and
money in the effort to get up new aud
improved machines.
Standard Sweeping Machine.
The standard sweeping machine is the
simplest form that can be gotten up; for
simplicity is necessity to which all other
theoretical advantages have yielded. A
| tWo-horse sweeper costs the city $3.50.
1t has large pair of wheels behind and
small swiveled truck in front. Under
the rear wheels is hung the cylindrical
broom. which is about 10 feet long. and
which, when new, is about three feet in
diameter. The brooms are used. how
ever, until theJ are worn down to less
| than half that diameter. They are made
of material called bass or of rattan.
Sometimes bass and rattan are mixed.
Especially good results are claimed for
the combin alton, as the stiff rattan digs
out the mud, while the finer bass sweeps
| away the dust.
The broom is Lung at an angle of GO
degrees 10 the line of travel of the sweep
er, which inclines it 80 degrees to the
n ain axle. A countershsft takes the
motion from the revolving axle, through
| bevele gearing. and sproket chain runs
down from the countarshaft to the
| broom. The gearing is usually so pro-
portioned that the broom makes three
revolutions to one revolution OF the rear
wheels of the sweeper, and in the orpo-
site direction. The broom can be lifted
up and tarown cut of gear by the driver
| when the machine 10 not sweepiDg.
The dirt is tumbled over and over by
tho broom, which gradually works to the
right hand side and leaves it there in 4
wlndrow. The two-horse mschine
sweeps swsth about eight feet wide.
Number of Miles Covered.
Twenty miles is considered a good
mig ats work for one machine and pair OF
horses. As the machine must travel bsck
and forth from four 10 six times 10 sweep
Il street, it can sweep completely only
from three to five miles of streets in .
| night. In Washington they use large
four-horse sweerers, because they can be
handled to advantage in the broad ave-
MUGS OF the capital. 1t would be toe
much bother turning them around
in New Y0rk's narrow thoroughfares
With the arrangement OF brooms de
ecribed each particle of dirt is swep,
diagOnslly across the street and if it is on
the extreme left it will be carried aNeul
forty feet forward in order to get it eigh,
feet across 10 the "indrow where it is
dropped. AS the joints of the psvemen,
run straight across a. right angles, il is
evidently desirable that the broom should
sweep along these joints. Not only would
the joint then be cleaned out, but the
dirt would be swept directly to the wind
row instesd of being tumoled over and
oyer while the machine is travelling forty
| teet. One engineer recently built m :
chine that did sweep exactly at right
| angles across the street, but it ran hard
| and took more horses TO pull it. and the
4 mechanism wasn't quite SO simple as tina,
| Of the old machine.
''Pick Up" Device.
Another object of much invention is
! the construction OF q good "pick up
| mschine-one that picks up and carries
Oh its ewn sweepings instead of leaving
them in the windrow. Some have been
built that worked fairly well on a smooth
asphalt pavement, but they are likely to
! get ous OF order ard work imperfec.ly-
while q rough pavement knocks them out
completely.
DIR. Smith, formerly health officer of
New Work, has spent over thousand
jdollars on pickup machine which he
had on exhibition ut the last American
! institute fair. II had the ordinary form
OF broom, but instead Of dropping the
windows of dirt in the street, it depos-
lied At on g belt which carried the dit up
and dropped it into T. box. This
picked up about three-fourths OF the
dirt. but the other quarter was left in
the shape Of little windrow of stuff
that was thrown beyond the belt So
the problem is still unsolved in an en-
-el, a I; &c