Discoveries and Inventions of the Nineteenth CenturyRoutledge, Robert
History
Discoveries and Inventions of the Nineteenth Century
Routledge, Robert
Inventions -- History -- 19th century
In another measuring machine on the same principle the delicacy of the
measurement has been carried still farther, by substituting for the
large divided wheel one having 200 teeth, which engage an endless screw
or worm. This will easily be understood by reference to Fig. 31, where a
similar arrangement is applied to another purpose. Imagine that a wheel
like P, Fig. 31, but with 200 teeth, has taken the place of E in Fig.
30, and that the wheel, T, on the axis of the endless screw is shaped
like E, Fig. 30. One turn of the axis carrying the endless screw,
therefore, turns the wheel through 1/200 of a revolution, and as this
axis bears a graduated head, having 250 divisions, the screw having 20
threads to the inch, is, when one division passes the index, advanced
through a space equal to 1/250 × 1/200 × 1/20, or 1/1000000 an inch;
that is, the one-millionth part of an inch. This is an interval so small
that ten times its length would hardly be appreciated with the highest
powers of the microscope, and the machine is far too delicate for any
practical requirements of the present day. It will indicate the
expansion caused by heat in an iron bar which has merely been touched
with the finger for an instant, and even the difference of length
produced by the heat radiated from the person using it. A movement of
1/1000000 of an inch is shown by the gravity-piece remaining suspended
instead of falling, and the piece falls again when the tangent-screw is
turned back through 1/250 of a revolution, a difference of reading
representing a possible movement of the measuring surface through only
2/1000000 an inch. This proves the marvellous perfection of the
workmanship, for it shows that the amount of play in the bearings of the
screws does not exceed one-millionth of an inch.
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