Langley Memoir on Mechanical Flight, Parts I and II: Smithsonian Contributions to Knowledge, Volume 27 Number 3, Publication 1948, 1911Langley, S. P. (Samuel Pierpont)
History
Langley Memoir on Mechanical Flight, Parts I and II: Smithsonian Contributions to Knowledge, Volume 27 Number 3, Publication 1948, 1911
Langley, S. P. (Samuel Pierpont)
Aeronautics; Flight
The result of the first experiments with these improvements
demonstrated that, within certain limits, the amount of water
evaporated is proportional to the circulation, and in this boiler
the circulation was still the thing that was at fault. Finally, the
results of the experiments with the two-stranded, triple-coil boiler
may be summed up in the statement that it was possible to maintain a
pressure of 80 pounds, and that with it the engines could be made to
develop from 0.3 to 0.4 H. P. at best. It weighed 650 grammes (1.43
pounds) without the asbestos jacket.
About this time the writer had the good fortune to secure the
temporary services of Dr. Carl Barus, an accomplished physicist, with
whose aid a great variety of boilers were experimented on.
The next form of boiler tested was that shown at ‹N› (Plate 13), made
on a system of coils in parallel, of which there were twenty complete
turns. In the first test it generated but 20 pounds of steam, because
the flame refused to work in the colder coils. The work of this
boiler was very unsatisfactory, and it was only with the greatest
difficulty that more than ten pounds pressure could be maintained.
There was trouble, too, with the circulation, in that when the flame
was in full play the pump seemed to meet an almost solid resistance,
so that it could not be made to do its work.
A new boiler was accordingly made, consisting of three coils of four
strands each. With this the pump worked easily, but whereas it was
expected to get 120 pounds pressure, the best that could be obtained
was 70 pounds. The outer coil was then stripped off, and a trial made
in which everything ran smoothly and the pressure mounted momentarily
to 90 pounds. After some adjustment, a mean pressure of 80 pounds was
obtained, giving 730 revolutions of the engine per minute, with an
indicated horse-power of 0.32.
It was shown in this work that, within certain limits, steam is
generated most rapidly when it is used most rapidly, so that two
engines could be used [p059] almost as well as one, the reason
apparently being that the rapid circulation increased the steam
generating power of the boiler, and that the engines worked best at
about 80 pounds. It was also found that a larger tubing was better
than the small, weight for weight, this fact being due to the greater
ease with which circulation could be maintained, since fewer coils
were necessary in order to obtain the same external heating surface.
The pressure in the coils and the separator was also much more nearly
equalized. The result was that the boiler temporarily approved was
one made of tubing 6.35 mm. (0.25 inch) in diameter, bent into a
two-coil, two-stranded boiler, having sixteen complete turns for each
strand in each coil. The total weight was 560 grammes (1.23 pounds)
with a total heating surface of 1300 sq. cm. (1.4 sq. ft.).
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