Democratic Sentinel, Volume 15, Number 11, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 3 April 1891 — CYCLING BY KEROSENE. [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

CYCLING BY KEROSENE.

A Ga'lon of Oil Will Carry Machine ami Rider Forty Miles. Very few of the many motors that have been designed for the propulsion of tricycles and other light vehicles have withstood the tests of practical use. Interest in this means of locomotion has not died out by any means, and there is a want that is still ununfilled. An English inventor, Mr. Edward Butler, of Greenwich, lias recently produced a petroleum-motor tricycle, which looks like a step toward the solution of the problem. A pretty good Idea of the general appearance of this machine is given in the cut herewith, which comes from the Scientific American’s column. This machine is designed to run forty miles at a speed of three to ten miles pc hour upon a consumption of one gallon of kerosene or benzine. At each

side of the driving-wheel is a motor cylinder, the pistons of which operate the rear wheel of the tricycle by means of a crankshaft and a specially devised epicyclic gear, which communicates the motion of the shaft to the wheel in the ratio of 6 to 1. The motors are driven by the explosion of a mixture of air and oil-spray in the cylinders, the ignition being effected by a current of electricity supplied by a small single-fluid battery under the seat. The machine is stopped, not by stopping the engine, but by raising the driving-wheel from the ground by a foot-lever, whicl throws the weight of this portion of the machine upon small castor-wheels. Ir. starting the driving-wheel is merely lowered to the ground again, the engine being already in motion. The whole framing of this machine is made of oval steel tubing, and the entire apparatus weighs 289 pounds.