IMPROVED MEANS FOR WARMING THE CARRIAGES OF RAIL AND TRAMWAYS PARTLY APPLICABLE FOR FORMING THE PIPE CONNECTIONS OF RAILWAY BREAK AND COMMUNICATING APPARATUS
Year: 1882

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by Thomas Perkins at the Office of the
Commissioners of Patents on the 8th November 1882.
THOMAS PERKINS of Hitchin in the County of Herts "IMPROVED MEANS FOR
WARMING THE CARRIAGES OF RAIL AND TRAMWAYS PARTLY APPLICABLE FOR
FORMING THE PIPE CONNECTIONS OF RAILWAY BREAK AND COMMUNICATING
APPARATUS
"
This Invention has mainly for its object to admit of railway carriages being
efficiently warmed by means of steam supplied from the locomotive.
Hitherto objections have been raised to conveying steam from the locomotive
through pipes along the train for the purpose of warming the carriages on account
of its increasing the number of pipe couplings which have to be released or made
fast when a train of carriages is made up or unmade and also that the warming of
the carriages at the rear end of a train by steam conveyed along a pipe or pipes
from the locomotive is very defective owing to the accumulation of water in the
pipes from the condensation of steam which accumulates especially in the flexible
pipe couplings by which the metal pipes on one carriage have been coupled to the
metal pipes on the adjoining carriages and which usually hang down in a loop or
bend. In order to remedy these inconveniences I make the connections between
the metal pipes on one carriage and the metal pipes on the carriages adjoining its
two ends in the following manner.
Two short pipes are made to extend lengthwise from each end of each carriage
at the same level and one on one side of the central line of the carriage and the
other on the other side. They are made to be at the same level on all the carriages
and at the same distance apart from one another. One of the two pipes at each
end of a carriage is made funnel mouthed the other has around it a ring of vulca-
nized india rubber which is circular in cross section. The pipes are made to stand
out horizontally from the ends of the carriages so that when two carriages are put
together the pipes on the one carriage always meet the pipes on the other carriage.
The pipes with the ring around them will then enter the coned ends of the other
pipes and the coned ends form guides by which the pipes with the rings around
them are directed into the interior of the parallel portions of the bell mouthed
pipes. The rings as they enter the parallel sided portion of the bell mouthed pipes
Price 11

page_text: get compressed between this tubo and the inner tube which the ring embraces and
form a tight joint and as the pipes are pushed one into the other the rings roll
along the pipes so that the ring gets carried well into the interior of the outer pipe
and always remains in this pipe in spite of any to and fro play there may be
between the carriages by the play of their buffers.
Any up and down or sideway movement of either carriage is provided for by
the lengths of pipe which stand outwards from the ends of the carriages being
connected by a flexible joint either a short stout tube of india rubber or other short
length of flexible pipe to the main fixed pipe or pipes which pass from one end of
the carriage to the other.
This joint I either form of sufficient strength to normally hold the short lengths
of pipes carried by them horizontally or if the joint is not sufficiently strong for
this purpose then I use in addition spring supports to hold them normally in a
borizontal position but which spring supports will allow them to yield somewhat
either sidewise or up or down to allow for the up or down or sideway movement of
the carriages.
Each carriage or compartment may be fitted with a system of pipes through
which steam may be passed from the steam supply pipe.or if the carriage_or_com-
partment is not required to be warmed tho admission of steam to this system of
pipes can be cut off by closing a valve and the steam then allowed to pass direct
through the steam supply pipe only. The extremity of the steam supply pipe at
the rear end of the train might be left entirely open or partially closed or closed
with a lightly-loaded-valve.
--
The same system of forming the connections between the pipes on one carriage
to pipes on the adjoining carriages-may-be used for pipes through which hot water
or air is caused to circulate.
It may also be used for forming-the-pipe-connections requisite_for_continuous
railway break or communicating apparatus.
In place also of the short pipe of the pipe-coupling-which-has the ring_around_it_
being connected to the end of the carriage by a short length of flexible tube it may-
have another ring around it to fit into a socket or short length of pipe fixed in-the-
end of the carriage.
The coupling would then consist of the bell mouthed pipe fastened to one carriage
a socket or short length of pipe to the adjoining carriago with a length of pipe
having a ring at each end fitting into their respective pipes or sockets thus forming
a joint free to move in any direction.
Instead of these pipes the buffer rods of the carriages may be made hollow and
be fitted with connections similar to those described.