A HINT FOR MR RONAYNE.

Tuapeka Times, Volume XXV, Issue 4252, 26 June 1895, Page 6

A HINT FOR MR RONAYNE.

Major Panghorn, of the World's Transportation Commission, states :—": — " On the South Australian railways they have got a system of electric lighting that is better than anything we have seen anywhere else in the world. They have succeeded in working their electric lighting on the cars by means of a dynamo run from the axle. We in America do it by a dynamo run from the engine, and worked by steam. But our plan, you see, takes steam from the engine, and so lessens its power for actual work. In South Australia this is avoided, and the motive power of the revolving axles, which would otherwise be lost, is employed to work the dynamo. It is simply splendid. And that is not all we learned about electric lighting on trains in South Australia. It is a wonderful system of electric accumulation they have there. On the train from Adelaide to Broken Hill, for instance, the journey being at night, the electric lights are on all the time. Well, on the way back from Broken Hill to Adelaide, this journey being in the day, electrical energy is being stored up, ancl enough is stored to light the train on its return journey from Adelaide to Broken Hill, without any electrician being in attendance to look after it, so that they save the expense of an electrician every journey they make. Lighting by electricity on this system is actually less expensive than kerosene, and the light they get is the best light I ever saw on a car."