explained the locomotive car and trucks by models, and also exhibited a model of the automatic gate-opener referred to in the Paper. It had not been expected, he said, that gates would be required a t all, but the Government Inspectors insisted upon them. The cost of a gate-man would have teen a considerable item in the working expenses of the line, and accordingly Mr. Barcroft ha,d devised the automatic apparatus, which had worked without the least interruption, occasioning no difficulty, except when the tank got frozen. The Author also explained a model of the overhead conductor and collector. The copper wires, werc only No. 4, B.W.G., but they were sufficient for transmitting from 20 to 25 IXP. A section of the channel-steel conductor was also shown, a piece of the driving-chain, and a piece of the underground conductor. The chain difficulty was perhaps the greatest of any, and it had been overcome entirely by the chain constructed by Mr. Hans Renold.&fr. Kincaid.Mr. JOSEPH KINCAID said the elucidation of the subject of electricity as a motive power on railways and tramways was to him very interesting, as he was often called upon to advise on the motive power used on tramways and road-railways. With reference to the use of flangeless wagons, it was interesting to note that the same principle had been applied in another way in some of the road-railways in Staffordshire, where there were wagons running without flanges. These wagons were drawn from the tramways t o the works or factories by horses, and whcn running on the tramway rails they were carried on flanged wheels, which, by an easily applied mechanical arrangement, lifted the wagon off its flangeless wheels. A very large amount of goods traffic was carried on the road-tramways in Staffordshire by those wagons. They carried about 4 tons, and in the course of the year they enabled the tramway company to receive a large amount of additional income. He had no doubt that in future a considerable extension of the system would be adopted on tramways, whether worked by electricity or by other force.
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