The Calhoun chronicle. [volume] (Grantsville, W. Va.) 1883-1984, 1906-10-23
NURSING TROLLEY CARS.
THEY DEVELOP ALL SORTS OF
UNEXPECTED ILLNESSES.

The Wear and Tear on Them-Fat
Wheel Comes Like Appendicitis,
Says a faction Manager-TwelVe
Years the Average Life.
The average passenger in a trolley
car probably has an idea that a car
simply need be purchased and put on
the rails, whereupOn it can, like the
brook, go on forever. But trolley cars
develop all sorts of unexpected i'll
nesses: they have to be taken TO the
doctors, or. more prosaically, the re-
pair shops, at frequent intervals. and
their lives, considered from the point
of view of the human three score and
ten, are very short indeed Under the
most favorable circumstances a troll
ley car is not expected to last much
longer than twelve years. And, un-
like babies, remarked the car mana
ger, of a big traction company, trolley
cars require more and more care as
they grow older
In addition to the regular care con.
nected with embarrassing and
sweeping, the trolley car must be in
spected every few days-on most
roads twice a week-to see that the
apparatus is all in good order. This
is supplemented by an occasional
thorough oyerhauling. The superin.
tendent of the largest of the New Jer-
sey trolley companies says that on his
lines a new car may run 10000 miles
before it has to be overhauled, or, in
other words, may run about one hun
dred days. Cars operated entirely in
crowded cities have a shorter term of
activity, about sixty days, before they
go under the doctors hands AS
car gets older it has to be overhaIled
with greater frequency.
On the occasions of these overhaul
ings the trucks are removed from tho
car bodies, the motors taken out and
examined, the armatures cleaned and
the whole machinery thoroughly test
ed In addition to this the car body
must be painted and vanished and
thoroughly renovated at least once
year.
After the Overhauling a car is ready
for the road again, but at any time it
is likely to develop that most trouble
some ailment a fat wheel. A fiat
wheel is the terror of the operating
department of trolley line. 1t may
be compared to appendicitis be-
cause it comes when least expected,
but while a human being has bat
one appendix, car may go lame"
with a fiat wheel over and over again
and pound over the road, punching
holes in the rails and wearing out the
equipment at an astonishingly eXpen-
sive rate.
4 too sudden application of the
brakes, a piece of snow or ice frozen
TO the brake shoe, and the little spot
is on the wheel to stay there until
the whole steel circumference has
been laboriously ground into perfect
rOundness again. Up to the present
time no way has been found to avoid
this nuisance, expensive TO the COM
pany and annoying TO the public. The
best thing that can be done is TO send,
the car TO the shops there to substi-
tute a perfect wheel and grind down
the defective one at leisure. Accord
ing to experts of several companies,
about 3 per cent of the cars operated
on a line go 10 the shops with fiat
wheels in the course of month.
Naturally this repeated grinding
down of defective wheels has an eff
feet on the life Of the tires, for when
a tire becomes less than fve-eighths
of an inch thick it is thrown away
and a new one substituted. Ordinar-
lily it is calculated that two and
quarter inch tire will take five years
to wear down TO the minimum thick
ness The life of motor is longer.
about seven years, and the trucks last
at least as long as the car body. aboJt
decade
These things give an indication OF
the constant nursing a trolley car
must undergo In addition, there are
all sorts of minor details, such as
replacing broken windows and substi-
tuting new seats for old And the
life of car is, of course, likely To-
be materially shortened by unavolC-
able accidents such as collisions
Calculating that a car runs one
hundred miles day with $50 full
running day I'm q year and giving &C.
life of ten years, it may be assam
ed that car ON a suburban line will
travel $4,000 miles before 30 has to-
be put ON the retired list This is q
very liberal estimate I'm congested
cities like New York or Brooklyn, the
cars make a smaller mileage per day.
about ciehty-fvc miles.
But while the suburban trolley cars
go q longer journey than their city
brethren their lives arc not nearly
SO busy or, as the companies view &c.
they do not earn nearly so much per
mile or per car Hence one would
naturally expect the city cars to- be
smarter fin appearance and more COM
Portable and commodious. though
this is seldom the case New York
Post
ARTIFICIAL VARIATION or
SPECIES.