. Bulletin. Science. studied it becomes increasingly difficult to imagine by what qualifications he was regarded as either an elevator expert or designer by Eiffel and the Com- mission. His proposals appear, with one exception, to have been decidedly retrogressive, and, further, to incorporate the most undesirable features of those earlier systems he chose to borrow from. Nothing has been discovered regarding his work, if any, on elevators for the lower section of the Tower. Realiz- ing the difficulty of this aspect of the problem, he may not have attempted its solution, and confined his work
. Bulletin. Science. studied it becomes increasingly difficult to imagine by what qualifications he was regarded as either an elevator expert or designer by Eiffel and the Com- mission. His proposals appear, with one exception, to have been decidedly retrogressive, and, further, to incorporate the most undesirable features of those earlier systems he chose to borrow from. Nothing has been discovered regarding his work, if any, on elevators for the lower section of the Tower. Realiz- ing the difficulty of this aspect of the problem, he may not have attempted its solution, and confined his work to the upper half where the structure permitted a straight, vertical run. The Backmann design for the upper elevators was based upon a principle which had been attractive to many inventors in the mid-19th century period of ele- vator development—that of "screwing the car up" by means of a threaded element and a nut, either of which might be rotated and the other remain station- ary. The analogy to a nut and bolt made the scheme an obvious one at that early time, but its inherent complexity soon became equally evident and it never achieved practical success. Backmann projected two cylindrical cars that traveled in parallel shafts and balanced one another from opposite ends of common cables that passed over a sheave in the upperworks. Around the inside of each shaft extended a spiral Figure Q2.—Various levels of the Eiffel Towei (Adapted from Gustave Eiffel, La Trois Cents Metres, Paris, igoo, pi. i.). PAPER 19: ELEVATOR SYSTEMS OF THE EIFFEL TOWER 21. Please note that these images are extracted from scanned page images that may have been digitally enhanced for readability - coloration and appearance of these illustrations may not perfectly resemble the original Smithsonian Institution; United States. Dept. of the Interior; United States National Museum. Washington, Smithsonian Institution Press, [etc. ]; for sale by the Supt. of Docs. , U. S. Govt Print. Off
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