I therefore obviate this difficulty [the oscillation of the truck] by providing two inclined planes … formed double as shown and of an angle proportioned to the weight of the forward part of the locomotive and the velocity of the same…. The position of the inclines is such that the blocks [V’s] rest in the lowest part of the double inclines when the engine is on a straight track, and on coming onto a curve the inertia of the engine … is expended in going up the inclines, as the truck moves laterally toward the inner part of the curve; and on coming onto a straight line [p123] the blocks, descend to the bottom of the inclines and the engine is prevented from acquiring a sidewise or oscillating motion.
Figure 5.—Detail drawing of the radius-bar truck, patented by William S. Hudson in 1864, as applied to the New Jersey Railroad and Transportation Company No. 44. From Gustavus Weissenborn, American Locomotive Engineering and Railway Mechanism, New York, 1871, pl. 8.
Bissell applied for a U.S. patent on April 23, 1857. His petition was initially denied. A weary debate of several months duration followed between the patent examiner and Bissell’s attorneys.
During this time Bissell was busy promoting the application of his truck even though he had no patent for protection. In May of 1857 he showed a working model of his improvement to Gilbert M. Milligan, secretary of the Central Railroad Company of New Jersey.[5] Samuel L. Moore, master mechanic of that railroad, also inspected the model. Both were so impressed that it was decided to fit the device to the locomotive Lebanon, which at the time was undergoing repairs at the road’s Elizabeth Port, New Jersey, shops.[6] Although the engine was less than 18 months old, her tires were badly worn and she oscillated at high speed.
Early in June of that year a series of tests were held with the Lebanon. Moore said of these trials:[7]
After the said invention of Bissell had been applied the engine was run out onto a curve which she turned apparently with nearly as much facility as she would travel on a straight line, and the forward part of the engine rose on the inclines as the truck entered the curve and remained fixed while running around said curve and then resumed its former position on entering a straight track, and the trial was pronounced by all who saw it as most satisfactory, even by those who before pronounced that it would be a failure.
At a subsequent trial under a full pressure of steam and a velocity of about thirty miles per hour the entering and leaving the curve was equally satisfactory, the same being accurately observed by a man located on the cow catcher.
… The engine was run at its greatest possible velocity at least forty miles per hour on a straight track and the previous “shaking of the head” [oscillation] was found to be entirely overcome, and the engine run as steadily as a car would have done….