Note 24 — Chapter XIX

Speaking of the modifications introduced into his brake by Westinghouse since 1874, Mr. Thomas E. Harrison, civil engineer of the North Eastern Railway Company in a communication to the directors of that company of April 24, 1879, recommending the adoption by it of the Westinghouse, and subsequently ordered to be printed for the use of Parliament, thus referred to the triple valve: "As the most important [of these modifications] I will particularly draw your attention to the "triple-valve" which has been made a regular bugbear by the opponents of the system, and has been called complicated, delicate, and liable to get out of order, etc. * * * It is, in fact, as simple a piece of mechanism as well can be imagined, certain in its action, of durable materials, easily accessible to an ordinary workman for examination or cleaning, and there is nothing about it that can justify the term complication; on the contrary, it is a model of ingenuity and simplicity."