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Title: |
1904 Article-Port Huron Engine & Thresher Co., Steam Road Roller |
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Source: |
Good Roads Magazine May 1904 pg 241 |
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Insert Date: |
7/9/2011 9:53:34 PM |
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The Port Huron Engine & Thresher Co., of Port Huron, Michigan, has been building steam road rollers since 1900. That year its first roller was built and used on a government sample road constructed under the auspices of the office of road inquires. This company deserves more than a passing notice for the interest it has taken in the good roads cause and the liberal contributions it has made by furnishing machinery to build sample object lesson roads. It has worked out its own road tax by adding a piece of macadam road each year to the sample road built in 1900. The result is that road district No. 4, in Port Huron township, now has about four miles of good stone road, and the people are so well pleased with these roads that, this year, all the other road districts in this township voted to double their road tax and pay most of it in cash in order to make a start at permanent road building, and extend the roads of district No. 4 into other parts of the township. The Port Huron rollers were so well received that five, were sold in 1901, and each year since the sales have increased in more than a geometrical ratio. Last season this company brought out the roller illustrated on this page, which, in some respects, is a radical departure, from the old types of three wheeled rollers. In 1903, this new roller was first tried, and it has been pronounced a success by everyone who has seen it in operation. Its chief difference from other designs is in the manner of attaching the front roll to the boiler. This is done by means of a large steel post cast into a heavy yoke, which rests on the pivoted bearings at the front and rear of the roller frame, thus giving it almost a universal motion. The post fits into heavy castings, bolted to the top and bottom of the smoke box, inside, but in such a manner as to bring all the weight on the outside and at the bottom of the boiler shell. Thus the thrust comes on the outside of two arches, viz.: the boiler shell, which is doubled for this purpose, and the yoke before mentioned. The advantages claimed for this design are: Perfectly free access to flues for cleaning, great strength, freedom of motion, and full sized smoke box, thus insuring perfect draught. In fact, it makes it possible to build a medium weight roller having very large boiler capacity and yet preserve as much tractive power for its weight as in the separated front roll machine still built by this firm. |
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1904 Port Huron Engine & Thresher Co., Steam Road Roller & Locomotive
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