In 1814 the Dolcoath pumping engines, with Trevithick's cylindrical
boiler and high steam expansion, are thus reported:--"The Boulton
and Watt, Dolcoath great double engine, 63-inch cylinder, did a duty
of 21-1/2 millions; the Shammal 45-inch cylinder, single engine,
did 26-3/4 millions; and the 63-inch single, Stray Park engine, 32
millions." Shammal engine, nearly 100 years old, beat the Watt engine
of more than half a century later; and so did Stray Park 63-inch, which
Watt had laughed at when he first tried his hand as an engineer in
Cornwall in 1777.[82]
[Footnote 82: See vol. i., p. 30; vol. ii., p. 115.]
The marked change in these three engines, while for two or three years
under Trevithick's guidance, becoming more powerful and economical,
raised the usual swarm of detractors, and in 1815 a special trial was
made, which lasted for two days, to test the reported increased duty by
the cylindrical boilers and expansive working.
The unbelievers were then convinced, and agreed to throw out the
Boulton and Watt great double engine 63-inch cylinder, together with
its neighbour, the worn-out old 45-inch, and put in their stead one
engine with a cylinder of 76 inches in diameter, with expansive valve
and gear, and parts strong enough and suitable to the high-pressure
steam, on Trevithick's promise that it should do more than the combined
work of the other two with one-half the coal.
In 1816 this new engine commenced work, and did forty millions of
duty, increasing it during the next two or three years to forty-eight
millions, being three times the duty performed by the Watt 63-inch
double engine before it was supplied with steam from Trevithick's
boilers, and twice as much as it performed when so supplied. Lean
says, "This was the first instance of such duty having been performed
by an engine of that simple construction." The other mines followed
Trevithick's advice, but never paid him a penny. On this Lean again
says, "The engines at work in the county in 1835 would have consumed
80,000_l._ worth of coal over and above their actual consumption
yearly, but for the improvements that had been made since 1814."
Trevithick's engines were very durable, as well as cheap in first cost
and in working expense. This famous Dolcoath 76-inch engine remained
in constant work night and day for fifty-four years; after which good
service the steam-pipes, being thinned by rust, were held together by
bands and bolts; the steam-case around the cylinder would no longer
bear the pressure of steam; the interior of the cylinder from wear was
one inch larger in diameter than when first put in, and had to be held
together by strap-bolts. The original boilers were said to remain, only
they had been repaired until not an original plate remained; but there
they were in the old stoke-hole in 1869, when, from the fear of some
part of the engine breaking and causing accident, it was removed.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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