TRAIN TRAFFIC AND WIRELES TELEPHONY.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XLV, Issue 18, 3 May 1911, Page 57

TRAIN TRAFFIC AND WIRELES TELEPHONY.

A moot inyenious apparatus which, it is claimed, not only enables wirelesf telephone messages to be sent to ami received by trains in motion but wd render it possible to prevent many rad ■way accidents, has been invented by Mr Hans von Kramer, an electrical engineer, who lives at Witton, near Birming ba tn. The “railophone,” as the device is call ed, has been tested on the London and Brighton line, on which messages were sent and received whilst a train was running between forty and fifty miles an hour, and the apparatus is now being fixed on ten miles of the Stratford-on-Avon and Midland Junction Railway for a more prolonged and exhaustive test to be spread over several months. The principle applied is that of induction emanating from a large wire frame

suspended near the track frigu the Lot-, tom of * railway coach. Frou) thia frame, the terminal* of which are connected with a telephone box in the train, electric waves are induced into a wire laid parallel with the rails on which the train is running. The ends of this wire runnir.-g along the rails are connected up with telephones at the signal boxes or railway stations, whence messages received from trains are transmitted to their destination.

Not only is continuous communication stated to be possible between moving

trains and railway stations and signal boxes, but messages can also be transmitted between trains in motion on the same track. rhe advantages of the system are, therefore, by no means eonfined to the provision of facilities enabling passengers to send and receive messages during the journey. The use of the •‘railophone” in detective work and in case of accidents or unexpected occurrences, sueli as the train being stopped by snow or ‘ held up” through other causes, are other instances of its application.

Of most publie interest, however, is the claim that* the invention used for the purpose of signalling, prevent su<h railway disasters as those which recently occurred at Hawes .function and in South Wales. I’iMtfected by any conditions of weather, the “railophone” may be employed to give an automatic warning to a train approa-htng the danger zone, perhaps a couple of miles at»av.

It is explained, for instance, that had the system been in vogue the light en-

gine at Hawes Junction would havw directly its brakes were applied. only kept a bell or “buzzer” ringing i B the signal-box son e distance away, thug compelling the attention of the signalman, but would also have set a warning l>ell in action as swu as the Scot, h Cypress approaeh-d wF.hie the distan.« indicated. Similarh. in regard to th« Ss-uth Wales smash, it is contended that automatic warning by wireless telepho-y would have indicated to those in charge of the passenger train the preaenea of the goods train ahead.