Addis monorail

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Addis' Single Rail tramway in Roorkee Treatise on Civil Engineering in India , 1877
Addis Monorail, in The Engineer, June 17, 1870, p. 377

The Addis monorail ( English : Addis's Single Rail Tramway ) was a monorail system invented by William Judson Addis in 1869 .

history

William Judson Addis of Thane (formerly Tanna) in India invented, patented and developed a monorail that ran ox carts. Their double flanged wheels transferred most of the load to the metal rail, while two conventional support wheels prevented it from tipping over. A wagon loaded with three tons could easily be pulled by two draw oxen.

Addis received its first patent in 1869 and a second patent with improvements to the rails in 1870. The investment costs for sleepers and rails were less than half that of a conventional narrow-gauge railway, so that one kilometer could be laid for a good 3,000 Indian rupees . The rails were laid to the right and left of existing roads, one in each direction. They only protruded 40–50 mm (1½– 2  inches ) above street level, so that ordinary traffic was as little affected as possible.

To demonstrate the advantages of his invention, WJ Addis laid a test track in his ironworks in Thane, on which two trucks he had built drove. Part of the route had a gradient of 1 in 40 (25 ‰) and the other, in the flat, an arc with a radius of only 3 meters. The test track was visited by many government officials and others, who were delighted with the ease with which two draw oxen could pull a three-ton wagon.

The wheel flange-guided wheels in the middle were adjustable in height via a spindle , so that the support wheels were positioned about 25-50 mm above road level and almost the entire weight was transferred via the rail in order to minimize friction. In some attempts, a block of wood was placed on the road that one of the support wheels could drive over without the cart derailing. Even a small pothole did not lead to accidents.

A 2 km stretch was laid from Kalyan to Kalyan Bunder to transport salt. A 5.6 km long, double-track line was to be laid between Mhyjee station on the Great Indian Peninsula Railway (GIPR) and the Mhyjee fairground, also known as Maheji or Chinchkhed.

See also

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d The Engineer 1870/06/17. In: Grace's Guide. Accessed December 30, 2017 (requires free login).
  2. ↑ Addis System Monorail on Fibis.
  3. ↑ UK Patent No. 1850. Issued January 14, 1869.
  4. ↑ UK Patent No. 90. Issued January 12, 1870.
  5. ^ Imperial Gazetteer of India, Volume 17, p. 8.