A diminution of the cost for repairs of rolling stock (on an average equal to
12 pounds per ann.), and of the cost for compensation to customers for
breakage and pilferage, should be a leading object with every sensible
railway director. Indeed these losses, with deadweight, and lawyer's bills,
are the deadly enemies of railway directors.
Further improvements in these waggons have been effected by the use of
corrugated iron, which is light and strong at the same time; and the iron
waggons have been again improved by employing iron covered with a thin
coating of glass, under a new patent, which renders rust impossible and paint
unnecessary. The simple contrivance by which the door and moveable roof is
locked and unlocked by one motion, is worthy of the notice of practical men.
600 of these lock-up waggons, with springs and buffers, are in use on the
London and North Western Railway.
Mr. Henson has also succeeded in establishing a traffic in gunpowder, by
inventing a carriage of sheet iron, lined with wood, in which four-and-a-half
tons of gunpowder can be conveyed without fear of explosion either from
concussion or external combustion.
The shops at Camden have room for building or repairing 100 waggons.
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