6,08 SCIENTIFIC RECORD FOR 1882. 



utes with a current of the average strength of 8.5 amperes, requiring 

 1.558 horse-power. The total work expended in charging, therefore, was 

 6,020,000 kilogrammeters. The battery was then discharged through 

 eleven Maxim lamps, and required eleven hours. From this it appeared 

 that 60 per cent, of the energy stored in the accumulators could be re- 

 covered as electric current. {Nature^ January, March, xxv, pp. 299, 476.) 



Ayrton and Perry have published an account of their experiments on 

 the Faure accumulator, using a single cell containing 81 pounds of red 

 lead. It gave on discharge a mean current of 18 amperes for eighteen 

 hours, or a total work of 1,410,000 foot-pounds, equivalent to a horse- 

 power for 43 minutes ; thus giving a capacity of 18,000 foot-pounds per 

 pound of red lead. They find that up to a million foot-i^ounds the loss 

 in storage need not be greater than 18 per cent., provided the charging 

 and discharging be slow. [Phil. Mag., July, V, xiv, p. 41.) 



Ayrton, in a lecture delivered at the London Institution in March 

 upon the storage of energy, discussed at length the economy of the 

 accumulator for commercial purposes, as lighting and power. {Nature, 

 March, xxv, p. 495.) 



De Kabath has devised a new form of secondary battery which fs 

 practically a Plante, but which has been specially devised for exposing 

 a very great surface. Corrugated strips of lead are jiacked closely to- 

 gether to form the plates. The forming is done with the current as in 

 the Plants battery. {Nature, June, xxvi, p. 180.) 



At the Montreal meeting of the American Association, Barker pre- 

 sented a paper giving the results of his experiments with the Faure and 

 the Plante secondary batteries. He takes the ground that the action of 

 the battery is a purely chemical one, " the amount of electricity obtained 

 from a given secondary battery being jiroportional to the amount of 

 electrolytic products deposited upon its plates." The Faure cells used 

 were of the type exhibited at the Paris Exhibition, each exposing about 

 1.5 square meters of surface, and weighing 17 kilograms. The electro- 

 motive force was about two volts as a mean, and the internal resistance 

 0.02 ohm. In charging the 32 cells employed, the current strength was 

 generally 15 amperes, a specially-devised cut-out being put in circuit 

 to prevent the discharge of the battery through the machine if from any 

 cause the electromotive force of the latter fell. The author concludes 

 that to the very considerable local action which takes place in these 

 batteries, and to the want of uniformity in the different cells, is due in 

 large measure their low efficiency. (Proc. Am. Assoc. Adv. Sei., 1882, 

 XXXI, 207.) 



