Cast-Iron Car Wheels. [Volume: 8, Issue: 3, 1889, pp. 153-170]

No. 3.1

CHARCOAL IRON WORKERS.

169

end in old metal. Some who are making this demand in their
new equipments, are in my judgment pioneers in the direction
which we will follow at no distant period.
The history of the highly perfected development of cast iron
car wheels is from many efforts, on theories propounded from
many brains. The mass of such theories have marked the road
all along the line as failures, yet good and substantial progress
has been made, and cast car wheel makers may well be proud of
their advances. They have fought their way along the line with
wrought iron and all kinds of steel wheels, and they still roll
along. Their economy, durability and efficiency stand their
backers for their staying qualities. The wrought iron wheel, the
paper wheel, the steel wheel have come, and some have gone;
others may follow, while the cast iron wheel takes a new grip on
the railroad confidence for its sterling qualities on an economic
basis.
In the forty years I have been a wheel maker I have seen many
new claims for superiority. I have seen a great plant, sanguine
in the minds of the management, starting out on great discoveries,
land in discredit. I have seen, on the opposite, good common
sense, sticking to known methods, plod its way along in years of
successful operations.
I think Mr. Lobdell is the oldest car wheel-maker in the United
States to-day; he has been identified with wheel manufacture
from its earliest history, and he could give information that
would be exceedingly interesting.
Mr. GEO. G.,LOBDELL. I think that wheels for 60,000-lb. cars
should weigh at least 600 lbs. I am willing to admit that a good
wheel weighing 575 lbs. can be made, one that will stand the test of
the railroad companies, but I know that a better and safer wheel can
be made if it weighs 600 lbs. Wheels weighing 600 lbs. will admit
of a harder and more durable character of chill, and yet possess
sufficient strength and elasticity to resist the shocks to which they
are subjected, and the expansion of the tread by the application
of the brakes.
Of whatever weight the wheel may be, the different parts should
be in such proportion, and of such a form as is best calculated to
give the greatest strength and durability. The beet form, in my
opinion, to produce the most perfect and lasting chill, and to