A History of the Growth of the Steam-EngineThurston, Robert Henry
History
A History of the Growth of the Steam-Engine
Thurston, Robert Henry
Steam-engines -- History
which turned about a king-bolt at 9, gave the desired direction to the
forward wheels and to the carriage.
This seems to have been one of the best designs brought out at that
time. The boiler, built to carry 70 pounds, was safe and strong, and
was tested up to 800 pounds pressure. A forced draught was provided.
The engines were well placed, and of good design. The valve was
arranged to work the steam with expansion from half-stroke. The
feed-water was heated, and the steam slightly superheated. The boiler
here used has been since reproduced under new names by later
inventors, and is still used with satisfactory results. Modifications
of the "pipe-boiler" were made by several other makers of
steam-carriages also. Anderson & James made their boilers of
lap-welded iron tubes of one inch internal diameter and one-fifth inch
thick, and claimed for them perfect safety. Such tubes should have
sufficient strength to sustain a pressure of 20,000 pounds per square
inch. If made of such good iron as the makers claimed to have put into
them, "which worked like lead," they would, as was also claimed, when
ruptured, open by tearing, and discharge their contents without
producing the usual disastrous consequences of boiler explosions.
The primary principle of the sectional boiler was then well
understood. The boilers of Ogle & Summers were made up of pairs of
upright tubes, set one within the other, the intervening space being
filled with water and steam, and the flame passing through the inner
and around the outer tube of each pair.
One of the engines of Sir James Anderson and W. H. James was built in
1829. It had two 3-1/2-inch steam-cylinders, driving the rear wheels
independently. In James's earlier plan of 1824-'25, a pair of
cylinders was attached to each of the two halves into which the rear
axle was divided, and were arranged to drive cranks set at
right-angles with each other. The later machine weighed 3 tons, and
carried 15 passengers, on a rough graveled road across the Epping
Forest, at the rate of from 12 to 15 miles per hour. Steam was carried
at 300 pounds. Several tubes gave way in the welds, but the carriage
returned, carrying 24 passengers at the rate of 7 miles per hour. On a
later trial, with new boilers, the carriage again made 15 miles per
hour. It was, however, subject to frequent accidents, and was finally
withdrawn.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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