ville, the Centennial Exposition, in commemoration of the one hundredth anniversary of the State. During that period we hauled a very large number of people, trail cars behind every motor car, with a headway of from one to one and a half minutes regularly during the six months of the Exposition, and there were but six motors disabled. I think that record will justify me in stating that the application of steam railroad methods to street railway service has been entirely satisfactory to our company.

President Sergeant-Gentlemen, I hope this discussion. will go on. It seems to me that the subject is one that comes right home to all of us. There are a great many different practices in the country, I think, as to the number of men employed, and as to the frequency of inspection, and as to the records which are kept of failures on the street or the failures of armatures, fields, and other parts of the motor; and it seems to me that we should have a pretty free discussion here. I am unable, perhaps, to call on gentlemen by name, but I should be most happy to have them get up and announce their names and tell us what they know about it.

REMARKS OF MR. W. E. HARRINGTON ON "MAINTENANCE OF CAR EQUIPMENT."

Mr. Harrington, Camden-We have a road on which we operate at this time about forty-three cars, and do the bulk of our inspection and general repairs at night time. We do the general repairs and painting on the piecework system, and it is very satisfactory. One of the difficulties we found in adopting the piecework system was in fixing the price for the work, not having any precedent, and we struck upon a method of covering possible mistakes in price by limiting the amount of bonus that we would give. If we set a contract price for a piece of work at say five dollars, and the work was actually done for two dollars, that would make a profit of three dollars, which would be entirely disproportionate; so we settled on the limitation of twenty per cent of the actual cost. If it cost two dollars to do it and the price was five dollars, the bonus

man should be responsible for the proper inspection of all circuits, together with hood switches, fuse boxes and lightning arresters. Another should give his whole attention to controllers; while the brakeman and his assistant should be able to keep all brakes in good shape and replace all worn out shoes. This arrangement of inspection and overhauling should keep the truck and motor equipment in good shape, if the night men take equally as good care. The writer recommends doing as little work as possible at night. At a car house operating say one hundred cars, three men should be able to grease motors, inspect brushes and make any small trolley repairs. Car cleaning should come directly under the operating department. The night car cleaning should be limited to sweeping out, cleaning windows and dusting cars, while all washing should be done in the day time while the car "swings" or is on the stand, if the car house is on one end of the line. In connection with car cleaning, if the cars are of the closed type the seat risers and drop sash, the spice under the seat should be cleaned once a week, as the traveling public have a tendency to drop newspapers, apple-cores, etc., down behind the seat back, not to mention the bits of lunch the motormen and conductors drop there if their runs compel them to eat on the car. The best way to avoid this and to also save the annoyance of rattling sash, is to make the sash stationary and cover over the space between the top of the seat back and sash rail. This, of course, does away with blinds and compels the use of curtains. nance is reduced by using curtains and, at the same time, if you happen to be an official riding in a car of this type you need not be in fear of a passenger pulling a blind with three or four broken slats, and the whole thing covered with dust so thick that you can write your name on it with your finger.

The cost of mainte

A car-house from which one hundred cars are operated should have a good carpenter stationed there, to make small running repairs and to take care of bell-cords and register ringing devices. Any car that has been in a collision and damaged so badly that it could not be repaired in one day should be sent to the general repair shop. All cars should be taken to the general repair shop once a year and the body put in thorough repair and the car varnished or burnt off and painted anew, as the case may demand. While the car is in the carpenter's hands the wiring should be gone over carefully and put in shape. If the car goes to the shop with its regular truck and motors, the truck should be run out and gone over thoroughly. In case it is a built up truck, all rivets and bolts carefully inspected and renewed where necessary. In case of a solid side frame truck, it should be carefully squared to see that it has not sprung. The brake rigging at this time should be taken apart and if it is a truck with brake beams working in slides the beams should have what are termed "Dutchmen " jumped into the ends to bring the wearing parts back to their original thickness, as the beams will probably be found to have worn wedge shaped. If the

I have had nothing to do the last year or two. But my recollection is that we ran higher than ten per cent on single motors. Of course the number of miles run per day and the style of motors have a great deal to do with that.

REMARKS OF MR. E. C. FOSTER ON "MAINTENANCE ON CAR EQUIPMENT."

Mr. Foster, Lynn-I would like to ask Mr. Vander Veer if he considers that there is any economy in operating a single motor. As I understand, the gentlemen have been speaking of disabled cars which are lying in the car house during part of the day, and this, I understand, is due to defects in the apparatus, and one gentleman says that ten per cent of his cars were in the house all of the time. I might say, for the benefit of the Association, that we have not found it profitable to operate single motor cars, practically on account of the increased expense created in the maintenance of them, as compared with the double motor cars. This past season we have been operating one ten-bench open car with one pair of G. E. 57 motors of fifty-two horse power capacity each. That, as of course you all recognize, is much greater than the power required to operate a single ten-bench single truck car. But the result, so far as repairs are concerned, has been very satisfactory, there being no repairs necessary on that car the entire summer. The car has made about one hundred and twenty miles a day and we have not even worn out a set of brushes. Now, I believe it has been the custom in the past to operate a motor of too small capacity, and by reason of that small capacity the expense of maintenance has been increased very materially. I would ask the previous speaker if he has any figures as to the cost for labor of painting and varnishing the

cars.

FURTHER REMARKS OF MR. W. E. HARRINGTON ON MAINTENANCE OF CAR EQUIPMENT."

Mr. Harrington-In reference to the first matter, the depreciation in using single motor equipment, we have been using single motor equipment practically up to date, with the

ness being with steam railway systems, has probably diverted my mind in a different direction from the opinion of some street railway people in regard to the inspection and maintenance of street car equipments. You know that when a locomotive makes its trip of one hundred or perhaps one hundred and fifty to two hundred miles, it then enters the round house and is inspected and cleaned and all necessary repairs made before it makes its next trip. So with the line with which I am connected I adopted this method. When a car comes in from its trip of one hundred to one hundred and fifty miles, is it first cleaned, then inspected. All parts of the motors, including the wire connections, brush contacts, and all parts of the truck are properly inspected, loose parts tightened up, and all minor repairs made, and the car is prepared then for its journey on the following day. My experience with that method for perhaps ten years prompts me in saying it has been entirely satisfactory. It is argued by some that daylight inspection is better because the men have a better opportunity to see and perhaps feel more like working in daylight than they do at night. That is true to a certain extent, but with a limited car equipment, and perhaps with the car barns located in such a manner that it would be inconvenient to have the cars run in during the day from time to time to have the inspection, cleaning and repairs made, it therefore becomes necessary with some companies to do the work at night, and this to a large extent is so with the system in Nashville. But, as I have stated, the system of cleaning, inspecting and making minor repairs at night has been very satisfactory. If a car goes out in the morning and something occurs to disable the car and it is brought into the shed, and the defect is caused by the lack of inspection at night, proper action is taken, and that is an incentive to the night inspectors to do their work properly, because if they do not do it, results will tell. The general overhauling of the car is done by the regular repair force in daylight, and we make it a rule to give the motors a genuine overhauling perhaps once in six months. About two years ago we had a very large exposition in Nash

ville, the Centennial Exposition, in commemoration of the one hundredth anniversary of the State. During that period we hauled a very large number of people, trail cars behind every motor car, with a headway of from one to one and a half minutes regularly during the six months of the Exposition, and there were but six motors disabled. I think that record will justify me in stating that the application of steam railroad methods to street railway service has been entirely satisfactory to our company.

President Sergeant-Gentlemen, I hope this discussion will go on. It seems to me that the subject is one that comes right home to all of us. There are a great many different practices in the country, I think, as to the number of men employed, and as to the frequency of inspection, and as to the records which are kept of failures on the street or the failures of armatures, fields, and other parts of the motor; and it seems to me that we should have a pretty free discussion here. I am unable, perhaps, to call on gentlemen by name, but I should be most happy to have them get up and announce their names and tell us what they know about it.

REMARKS OF MR. W. E. HARRINGTON ON

ANCE OF CAR EQUIPMENT."

"MAINTEN

Mr. Harrington, Camden-We have a road on which we operate at this time about forty-three cars, and do the bulk of our inspection and general repairs at night time. We do the general repairs and painting on the piecework system, and it is very satisfactory. One of the difficulties we found in adopting the piecework system was in fixing the price for the work, not having any precedent, and we struck upon a method of covering possible mistakes in price by limiting the amount of bonus that we would give. If we set a contract price for a piece of work at say five dollars, and the work was actually done for two dollars, that would make a profit of three dollars, which would be entirely disproportionate; so we settled on the limitation of twenty per cent of the actual cost. If it cost two dollars to do it and the price was five dollars, the bonus