The Norfolk Virginian. [volume] (Norfolk, Va.) 186?-189?, 1895-08-22
WHEELS ON TOP OF WHEELS
locomotive to Run Ninety Miles an
Hour and Not Touch the Track.
Driving Wheels Rest on Wheels That
r st on Other Wheels Which Ride
the Track. TIE Invention of a
Min : polls Man. A Mar
vel of Me Chanical Genius.

There is now being built at tho Bald
win Locomotive works, i'll Philadel-
phia. All ordinary locomotive with driv-
ing wheels Of five feet diameter. which
it is said will rs soon Us completed
draw train Of cars from Philadelphia
TO this city in an hour, or just about
one half the timo now required by the
colossal and costly engines Of the Penn
sylvania road.
This claim is not made by the Bald
wins. They have nothing 10 say on the
subject. They ARE simply building the
locomotive for private parties and are
to receive their regular price Of SO, 900
for it. When it is completed their part
in the matter is ended The gentleman
who is paving for the locomotive is ".
J. Holman of Minneapolis, an elderly
inventor, who has been in the railroad
business all his life and who has now
invented something which. it is claimed,
will completely rcvolutionize railroad
ing
1t is not pretended that the ordinary
$40, 900 locomotive which the Baldwins
arc building would, if set upon any
Sailroad track be able to travel 90
miles an hour. The locomotive is not,
however TO be set on the rails as en-
gines generally are. When it is com
pleted, it is to be placed on what are
known ms the Holman friction geared
trucks, which will raise it 80 inches
above the surface of the rails
1t will BIO just like any other locomo-
tive except that each of its driving
wheels will rest upon and between two
smaller wheels, which in turn will rest
upon and between thrco other wheels
that finally rest on tho rails. The in
slant the drivers of tho locomotive be-
gin to turn they necessarily through
friction give an opposite rotary motion
to the small wheels upon which they
bear, and these small wheels just as
necessarily give 4 forward rotary mo-
ton to tho third set of wheels upon
which they are bearing. The natural
and inevitable result is that one revolu-
ton of the locomotives driving wheels
by this multiplicity OF wheels i'll pyra-
mid form carries tho locomotive forward
just twice us far rs single revolution
OF the driving wheels Oh the rails them
selves, In other words. the speed of the
engine, whatever that speed might be,
on the rails themselves is exactly dou-
bled by the use of this newly invented
truck.
In an experiment which was made
With an ordinary locomotive thus
mounted in Minnesota on branch Of
the Northern Pacific railroad recently o
speed of so miles was said to have been
easily attained. The invention has been
kept quiet, it being the purpose of those
interested 10 say nothing about it until
its practical utility was demonstrated
by run from Philadelphia to New
York within an hours time. That, it is
believed by the inventor, will be the
shortest and quickest way OF letting tho
world know that "a new marvel in me.
chanlcs has come into existence
IN, addition To the increase Of speed
attainablc this new invention will, it is
claimed, save millions of dollars
through the diminished wear and tear
upon the rails, for the weight OF loco
motives will then be farther distributed
along the track, aud ut no point of any
rail will there DO pressure more than
one-third rs great as is now exerted by
the driving wheels New York World.