Locomotives to Run on Ice

In the 2nd half of the last century in Russia there appeared unusual steam locomotives which were to move on ice.

The first steam locomotive of this kind was designed by Nathaniel Grew, an English engineer, and was only 15 ft in length. The designer believed his locomotive was an efficient and cheap means of transportation in winter conditions. This locomotive was sent to Moscow, and soon the Russian newspapers wrote it would be used for cross-lake freight traffic. Unlike modern locomotives this one had only two wheels. The rear of the locomotive was installed on a pair of skids, and the front had a similar but small­er skid.

There existed another strange locomotive, also designed by N. Grew. Like the first one this steam locomotive ope­rated in Russia in the winter 1861-1862, and it was then reported the locomotive was being used on Russian rivers handling passengers and freight.

Nobody knew at that time whether such locomotives would find application in the future.

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Brakes

(1) That railwaymen took great interest in the problem of stopping trains from the very beginning of railroading is quite evident. The fact is that troubles with brakes began on the Stockton & Darlington Railway when this first rail­ way line was only six weeks old.

(2) One day as the train was running over the rails a coupling device broke. Being freed from its load, the loco­motive leaped ahead (зд. рвануться). Having applied the brake the driver quickly stopped the engine, but he could not stop the train. The matter is that only the locomotive had brakes at that time. As a result, the cars came crushing (зд. врезаться) into the locomotive. That the cars them­selves must have brakes became clear to the railwaymen.

(3) Many efforts were made to develop a train brake and many types of brakes were devised. At last, George Westinghouse, an American engineer, invented a good air brake which could gradually stop the entire train. Having been improved, the Westinghouse brake found a wide application on railways.

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Buildings in Timber

(1) From time immemorial man has applied wood for building homes, particularly at places where trees grew in abundance. Wood being easily subjected to fire, wooden buildings of great architectural interest became rare nowa­days.

(2) One of the main features of wood is its property of insulation against cold. Sub-zero temperatures being common in Russia, wood was used there for houses as well as for churches. Up to now in our country there exist many remark­ able architectural monuments which are entirely built of wood, the ancient Russian churches being of particular interest in this respect. The onion-shaped domes they are decorated with are worth looking at.

(3) Another remarkable example of the old timberwork which is still to be seen in London is Westminster Hall. Being erected at the end of the 14th century, the building covers an area of nearly half an acre (about 2,000 m²). That the erection of Westminster Hall involved great man­ power is quite obvious for at that time only manual labour was made use of in construction work.

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TEXT 1. THE FIRST STEPS IN ELECTRIFYING LONDON’S UNDERGROUND

Steam traction originally used on London's Underground could not meet the requirements of passenger transporta­tion due to discomfort which it offered to public because of smoke. That's why transport authorities wanted to find the way of solving this problem.

One of the plans proposed was for a tube in which trains were to be cable-operated. But the plan was never realized for at that time it was decided to adopt electricity as the motive power. Most specialists believed a new type of traction to be introduced would provide a higher speed and would be less costly than the cable.

Thus in 1890 the first electric underground railway was opened for public traffic. Its trains were composed of three trailers hauled at a speed of 11.5 miles an hour by a 12-ton electric locomotive.

The electric locomotives on the first underground rail­ways were smaller in size compared with locomotives of later days, but they stood to many years of hard work, hauling 40-ton trains and riding at speeds up to 25 mph. These locomotives were simple in design and strongly built, with minimum of equipment which could give trouble. In short, they represented electric motors on wheels. It was these factors that were the main reason of their long life. The brakes installed were operated by compressed air.

The device called the "dead man's handle" used later was not known at that time, so a second man, called a "loco boy", was carried on the engine to take control of the train if "the driver became ill or lost control of the train.

All the current supplied to the Underground was gener­ated at a specially built power plant. The current was taken along the tunnel by feeder cable.

The first electric underground railway was a great success and attracted so many, passengers that it was decided, to increase the fare during the peak hours; but this unusual, measure was unnecessary for after the signalling was improved a more frequent service of trains was provided.