IMPROVED ROAD SWEEPER.

Western Star, 14 February 1922, Page 4

IMPROVED ROAD SWEEPER.

The ever-increasing cost of efficient street cleaning provides pi. wide .problem, wliicli in some measure seems to have been solved in an improved trailer road sweeper, which has been patented by J. L. Kirkbridb, of Auckland. ' This invention provides an improved construction of road .sweeper, the use of which effects a considerable saying of time and v.rmcy in the sweeping, -of roads. The machine is light, simple, and. •-.oinpact in construction, and can, if h'-'irod, be run by one many it may 'also be coupled to an ordinary dust

y.iri, and moved about without inconvenience to traffic. It "i«s designed for either horee or motor traction. The machine comprises a frame mounted on running "wheels, on the axle of which are mounted! uprights, ami from the latter horizontal arnns are suitably stayed. A rotary .brush driven through chain and sprocket gear from the running wheels or axle, is suspended below the outer ejids of the horizontal arms, by wire roj;;•(••; or chains passing; over pulleys and around; wheels or drums on a shaft or shafte at the top c)f the uprights, these shafts being, provided with one or more ratchet wheels and pawln, whereby .the brush may be raised or lowered. A covered-in elevator comprising an endless /belt with buckets thereon, picks up the ! sweepings, swept up by the rotary brush audi delivers them into a chute j leading into the dust cart, or into i a container mounted between arms or a frame- pivoted on the lower part of the sweeper. The elevator is also driven through chain and sprocket gearing . irom the running . wheels' or the axle, the lower end of the conveyor frame being fitted with wheels or rollers to run on the road'. Side brushes set at an angle to the machine, and nwunted at the ends of arms arc jointed and provided with springs, which absorb shock and jar. The side blushes aroused for sweeping gutters and water tables -without allowing, the running wheels to foul the kerbstones and deliver their sweepings into the path of the rotary oru>:h, wo that they will be- picked up and delivered into the cart of the sweepings container. The -.li'-pensiou of the rotary brush as indicated enables the latter to ;bc set a,s required in relation, to the road surface, and also permitis it, to 'a: raised elf the latter when shifting the machine- from place to place. T ;e container arms or frame is pivoted In- allow the sak'i container to be moved or swung front one hide of the sweeper to the other.