CHEAP HOUSES AND MOTORS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLIV, Issue 13614, 6 December 1907, Page 6

CHEAP HOUSES AND MOTORS.

MB,. EDISON'S ' CLAIMS. New : York, October 19.— Thomas A. Edison, the inventor, told 300 members of the American Electro-Chemical Society yesterday that he Has solved, the problem of cheap homes for ';,• working,men. He; is about to erect one as an experiment. His plan is to use iron moulds, arid to .pour in concrete. The work of setting ?up the mould and pouring in cement wonld require fewer than 12 hours, and a houste 25ft'by 45ft, costing under £200, would be .ready in six days. . Tlte house would harden and settle, would be practically indestructible, and would need no insurance, the only woodwork being a strip to permit of tho tacking of carpets. V Mr. Edison also announced that he; has j perfected an electric storage battery, so that horses will , soon disappear from. city, streets except for pleasure. " With a compact storage battery of almost unlimited capacity, the traffic problem will be solved, and the automobile will -become so cheap ak to be within the reach of every man who\ can now afford his own horse.'* Anxious to learn more about this battery, the New York correspondent of the London Daily Mail journeyed this morning to West I Orange, and found the great inventor-in his i shirt sleeves, busily engaged,, as usual, in : the world-famous laboratory. •'. . "■:•, "Yes, ; he said, "the horSe is doomed. He will begin to pass from the cities in December, when the manufacture of my im-1 proved battery will be started."' 1 ! - So that in the near future," I observed. " every man of moderate means will be able to dispense with tramway cars, and ride his own storage-battery 'runabout?'" -' .."Well," replied Mr. Edison, who is in the brightest spirits and the pink of health,. " that is not the main object of my invention. My primary aim has been to find a means ot relieving the intolerable congestion of traffic in over-populated cities. To do that it was necessary to furnish a battery so durable that its high cost would be of no account It was not my wish to put on. -the market. - unperfected * storage batteries. . Ihe demand, however, has been so persistent that I have been obliged to turn out some 300 of them in. the year. "But two months hence "the perfected battery will be an accomplished fact, and butchers and small tradesmen will bo able to acquire a waggon that will run more miles during its lifetime than any horse. Now, I..have in : this building a batterv that will last for 50,000 miles. A truck armed with it as motive power could carry twice as , much, travel - twice as fast ' and occupy half the space of a horse and'wasgon.<'. -".- . -: •.."-. -.-'■■■y. .*»