The Steam Engine Familiarly Explained and Illustrated: With an historical sketch of its invention and progressive improvement; its applications to navigation and railways; with plain axioms for railway speculatorsLardner, Dionysius
History
The Steam Engine Familiarly Explained and Illustrated: With an historical sketch of its invention and progressive improvement; its applications to navigation and railways; with plain axioms for railway speculators
Lardner, Dionysius
Steam-engines -- Early works to 1850
"The base of the boiler and the summit are composed of cross pieces,
cylindrical within and square without; there are holes bored through
these cross pieces, and inserted through the whole is an air tube. The
inner hole of the lower surface, and the under hole of the upper
surface, are rather larger than the other ones. Round the air tube is
placed a small cylinder, the collar of which fits round the larger
aperture on the inner surface of the lower frame, and the under
surface of the upper frame-work. These are both drawn together by
screws from the top; these cross pieces are united by connecting
pieces, the whole strongly bolted together; so that we obtain, in one
tenth of the space, and with one tenth of the weight, the same heating
surface and power as is now obtained in other and low-pressure
boilers, with incalculably greater safety. Our present experimental
boiler contains 250 superficial feet of heating surface in the space
of 3 feet 8 inches high, 3 feet long, and 2 feet 4 inches broad, and
weighs about 8 cwt. We supply the two cylinders with steam,
communicating by their pistons with a crank axle, to the ends of which
either one or both wheels are affixed, as may be required. One wheel
is found to be sufficient, except under very difficult circumstances,
and when the elevation is about one foot in six, to impel the vehicle
forward.
"The cylinders of which the boiler is composed are so small as to bear
a greater pressure than could be produced by the quantity of fire
beneath the boiler; and if any one of these cylinders should be
injured by violence, or any other way, it would become merely a safety
valve to the rest. We never, with the greatest pressure, burst, rent,
or injured our boiler; and it has not once required cleaning, after
having been in use twelve months."
(112.) Dr. _Church_ of Birmingham has obtained a succession of patents
for contrivances connected with a locomotive engine for stone roads;
and a company, consisting of a considerable number of individuals,
possessing sufficient capital, has been formed in Birmingham for
carrying into effect his designs, and working carriages on his
principle. The present boiler of Dr. _Church_ is formed of copper. The
water is contained between two sheets of copper, united together by
copper nails, in a manner resembling the way in which the cloth
forming the top of a mattress or cushion is united with the cloth
which forms the bottom of it, except that the nails or pins, which
bind the sheets of copper, are much closer together. The water, in
fact, seems to be "quilted" or "padded," in between two sheets of
thin copper. This double sheet of copper is formed into an oblong
rectangular box, the interior of which is the fire-place and ash-pit,
and over the end of which is the steam-chest. The great extent of
surface exposed to the immediate action of the fire causes steam to be
produced with great rapidity.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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