US387246A - Stock-car - Google Patents

Description

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J AMES MONTGOMERY, OE EAST MILLSTONE, NEW' JERSEY.

STOC'KHCAR.

SPECIFICATION forming part of Letters Patent No. 387,246, dated August 7, 1888.

Application filed April 4, 1888.

To aZZ whom t may concern.

Be it known that I, JAMES MONTGOMERY, a citizen of the United States, residing at East Millstone, in the county of Somerset and State of New Jersey,have invented a certain new and useful Improvement in Stock Cars, of which the following is a full, clear, and exact description.

The object of this invention is to provide for the conversion of ordinary livestock railway-cars, such as are in common use in the United States to-day, into what are sometimes calle( palace stock-ca1s-that is to say, cars which are supplied with facilities -for feeding and watering the cattle in the cars in transit, thus obviating the necessity of unloading at railway stock-yards to feed and water the animals and again loading them into the cars.

In accordance with my invention I provide a water-tank of peculiar construction in the eenter ofthe roof ofthe car, and by branch pipes therefrom conduct the water from such tank to troughs arranged along the sides of the car between the ends and the doors, (which latter are on opposite sides oi' the car and midway between its ends,) the trough being` arranged to be operated from the ends of the car. I also provide folding hay-racks on the inside of the car, and above these racks and on the roof of the car I arrange bins to feed the hay to the racks. rIhese racks are of peculiar construction, as will appear further on.

My invention consists in the several parts and the details of their construction, combi* nation, and arrangement, hereinafter more particularly set forth and claimed.

In the accompanying drawings, in the several gures ofwhich like parts are similarly designated, Figure l is a side elevation of the body of a common stock-ear supplied with my improvements. Fig. 2 is an end view of the same. Fig. 3 is a vertical cross-section taken in the plane of line .t rv, Fig. l. Fig. 4 is a perspective view of the Water-tank, and Fig. 5 is a plan view of the rack.

The body a ofthe car will be assumed to be of the usual construction, and to it my appliances are secured, as I will now proceed to set forth. A water-tank, I), is arranged in the roof over the doors, (which in common stockcars are in the sides and opposite and midway Serial No. 269,598. (No model.)

between the ends of the car.) Openings are made in the roof on either side of the ridgepole, but without cutting the ridgepole or impairing it in anywise, to admit of the arrangement of this water-tank, so that its outer portions. and cover c will be on level with the running-board on top of the car.

As shown more in detail in Figs. and 4, the water-tank is constructed with a bottom sloping in opposite directions from a median line, so as to be self'draining. At its two ends it has columns d d,whieh project upwardly on each side of the ridge-pole of the car and form inlets into the tank,whereby it may be filled with water, as by the apparatus set forth in my concurrent application for Letters Patent entitled Apparatus for Supplying Trains of Stock -Oars with fatela These inlets are provided with the hinged cover before mentioned. Overilow-pipes e e extend from these columns down the slant et' the car-roof to its eaves,so as to prevent overliow and carry away splash. From the lower ends of the bottom branch pipes ff lead to the watertroughs g, to fill them from the tank or receiver. If four water-troughs are used, the branch pipes will be in equal number; but if two troughs only be used, then but two branch pipes will be employed. I prefer to curve the ends of the branch pipes into a nearly horizontal plane, so as to conduct the water into the troughs with the least possible splash. rlhs may be accomplished by adding to these pipes any suitable nozzles or elbows or sponts. The watertroughs extend from the doors to the ends of the car and on both sides of the carwhere four troughs are used; but when only two troughs are employed, one may be on the far side, at the right of the drawings, and the other on the near side, at the left of the drawings, or vice versa. lI he troughs are arranged preferably to be operated together, and to this end, where four are used, they may be connected in pairs by extending their journals .7L through the ends of the cars, rigidly affixA ing to such journals the cranks i, and connecting thesecranks by links] with a common rod, la, which may be arranged vertically in bearings or eyes on the ends of the car, and extend up towithin easy reach of a train-hand ou the car-roof, so that by pull,-

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ing up the rod the troughs may be rotated or tilted, and thus be emptied of their contents, and by lowering the rod the troughs may be arranged to contain water. (')f course, if only one trough is used, but a single crank and link will be employed. It will be observed that this trough-operating mechanism serves also to retain the troughs in the positions they may be given. Each trough is arranged, by preference, in a gutter, l, which pitches outside the car,and so throws out of the car all splash and all waste from the troughs. These gutters have the vertical protectionvboards Z', to preserve the troughs from injury by the surging and crowding ofthe animals and by piling in bulk freight. The bottoms of the gutters and the protection boards are united and braced, and the whole secured to the car-sides by the metal brackets Z2. I will not here enter into a more detailed description of these troughs, inasmuch as they constitute part of the invention fully set forth in my concurrent application for patent entitled Improvement in StocleGars, A.

It is proper to remark here that this invention is not limited to any special construction of trough,aside from the operating mechanism therefor.

The water tank or receiver and the troughs are made, by preference, of metal.

Four hay-racks, m, may be arranged on the sides of the car, or, instead of four, two only may be employed, and in the latter case one will be on one side-say the near side-to the left ofthe door in the drawings, and the other on the far side, to the right ofthe door in the drawings. These racks will be hinged at their lower ends, as at a, to the sides of the car, so as to be capable of being folded up fiat against the sides ofthe car, in which position they are held by hooks 0 when not in use or when the car is to be used for inanimate merchandise. The racks are further provided with lips n, which engage stops u?, depending from the roof of the car,to support the racks in the inclined position shown for use. The roof of the car over these hay-racks is cutaway and replaced by hay-bins p, intorwhich hay is introduced and from which it-falls int-o the racks as the animals eat it. These bins have doors g, which fold back and uncover their interior, so as tov facilitate loading the bins with hay.

The preferred form of hay-rack is shown in Fig. 5, and its peculiarity is this, that the spaces m between the uprights m2 are about half the width ofthe adjacent uprights. The object of this construction is to offer great resistance to the animals pulling out great quantities of hay at a time and wasting it. I/Vhere there are small slats or uprights and the spaces are large, this facility of wasting hay is very great; but by putting in the wide uprights or slats and reducing the width of the intermediate spaces it is decreased to a minimum.

Common stock-cars may be equipped with my feeding and watering appliances at comparatively slight cost and with very slight alterations of the cars, as is obvious.

The application of my appliances in nowise impairs the utility of the cars for return freight of inanimate objects, such as packaged goods, lumber, rails, and so on.

If the commonv car to be supplied with my appliances has not the horn-rods"7 r r, so called, I prefer to add them, for they enable horned cattle more readily to get at the troughs for drinking,thehorns passingthese rods easily to the outside of the car.

Prior to this invention it has been proposed to provide a stock-car with a double roof, so as to make a hay-bin, the inner roof being made with slats and intervening spaces ot' equal l width and combined with a registerslide oflike construction, which may be moved across this slatted inner roof to contract the spaces or openings to prevent the cattle from pulling out an excess of hay, and so wasting it. The object ot' this construction, while the same as mine in making the rack of wide slats and narrow openings, is attained by obviouslydifferent means; and, moreover, the use of the said construction requires the reconstruction of the car-roof, while my hay-rack may be applied to any ordinary car in use without alterations of the car; hence I limit myself with respect to the hay-rack to one which is capable of being so applied and folded back against the side of the carwhen not in use, and which is a single frame.

It is quite common in stock-cars to provide the drinking-troughs with a water-shed; but, so far as I am aware, these water-sheds are only useful when thetroughs are tilted to discharge the water-that is to say, they do not contain the troughs while in use for drinking purposes, so as to catch the splash made by the drinking animals, and hence do not at all times and for all purposes receive the troughs. I there fore limit .my inventionin this particular to a gutter or water-sh ed which contains the trough wholly, and so receives the splash and the outturned water therefrom.

IVhat I claim is-a 1. A water-tank for use in stock-cars, consisting of a vessel having its bottom slanting in opposite directions from a median line or plane, discharge-pipes leading from the lower levels thereof, and inlet-columns adapted to straddle the ridgepole of the car-roof, and overliow-pipes leading down from the said inlets, substantially as described.

2. Water appliances for application to ordinary stock-cars, comprising a tank or reA ceiver straddling the ridge-pole a-nd suspended within the car from its roof and over the doors, distributing-pipes leading from such tank each side of such `car and terminating in spouts or outlets, and drinking-troughs,over which said spouts are arranged and into which they discharge the water, substantially as described.

3. The hayrack m for cars, having xed slats m2, of about twice the width of the fixed IOO IIO

Openings m between them, so as to impede the Withdrawal and consequently prevent the waste of hay, and fixedly hinged at its lower end to the side of the car and adapted to fold up flat against the side of the car, and provided with a lip, n', to engage stationary stops n2, depending from the car-roof, to hold the rack in position for use, substantially as described.

4. The gutter composed of the vertical protectionboards Z', slanting bottoms, and braces Z2, for connecting the protection-boards and bottoms and securing them to the sides of the car, in combination with the drinking'trough,

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