MECHANICAL IMPROVEMENTS AND INVENTIONS. 



515 



had the regular Republican nomination ; John 

 K. Tarbox, Democrat; and E. It. Hoar, \\ho 

 was supported as an Independent candidate by 

 the Republicans opposed to Butler. The vote 

 stood 12,100 for liutler, 9,879 for Tarbox, and 

 1,955 for Hoar. The Legislature of 1877, 

 chosen at the same time, consists of 33 Repub- 

 licans in the Senate and 178 in the House, and 

 7 Democrats in the Senate and G2 in the House, 

 making the Republican majority 26 in the Sen- 

 ate, 110 in the House, and 142 on joint ballot. 



MECHANICAL IMPROVEMENTS AND 

 INVENTIONS. The chief problem which en- 

 lists the ingenuity of mechanicians nt present 

 relates rather to the economy of fuel and its 

 more complete utilization in the steam-engine 

 than to the construction and the adjustment 

 of parts of our motors. Still important im- 

 provements in governors and prime movers 

 have lately been introduced ; while the fallacy 

 of the rotary engine is corning to be under- 

 stood, and the question of superheated steam, 

 the question of safety-compartment boilers, and 

 the matter of boiler material, are undergoing 

 liberal and full experimentation. The long 

 experiment made by the Government upon the 

 ship Gallatin on the relative merits of simple 

 and compound engines for sea-going purposes 

 have reasonably demonstrated the superiority 

 of the latter. The subject of the utilization 

 of the force of falling water, its application at 

 A distance, and its storage, is not neglected. 

 It is calculated that in the best-constructed 

 furnaces 80 or 85 per cent, of the mechani- 

 cal effect of the combustion is wasted; and 

 the economization of this enormous loss is 

 the burning question of the age in mechanics. 

 Its solution lies, it is thought, in the interme- 

 diation of some further chemical process, or 

 perhaps in the supplementation or substitution 

 of another force- evolving chemical transforma- 

 tion, perhaps in the ready generation and suc- 

 cessful domination of electrical force. In the 

 first connection hopes are entertained of the 

 new Lowe water-gas process, which can de- 

 monstrably be applied to the generation of 

 heat with a vast saving over the coal-furnace, 

 but only with the evolution of a terribly subtile 

 and deadly gas-poison. Of electrical motors 

 several different forms have been developed, 

 and there is promise of the cheap generation 

 of electricity on a large scale : the mechanical 

 generation of magneto-electricity is the method 

 which most engages the attention of experi- 

 mentalists. The possibility of conserving and 

 transporting mechanical force by means of 

 compressed air and otherwise is being utilized 

 in various novel ways. In telegraphy the 

 grand invention of the age is the duplex sys- 

 tem, described in the last volume. A still more 

 wonderful invention, sound - telegraphy, will 

 vastly increase the utility of the telegraph 

 for rapid correspondence. In railroad-engi- 

 neering the urgent need of a safety-coup- 

 ling has impressed itself upon the public mind. 

 A safety-coupling of Belgian invention finds 



much approval in England. Tho American air 

 and automatic brakes of WeHtiughouge air 

 acquiring full recognition. A new system of 

 automatic telegraphical signaling invented I \ 

 one of our citizens has been extensively intro- 

 duced upon our roads, and is heralded as a 

 triumph of ingenuity and utility. 



In the fouuderies of Terre Noire la Voolte 

 and Bessdges, in France, a process is in use for 

 the conversion of cast-iron, containing phos- 

 phoric impurities, into steel. Cast iron, con- 

 taining not over .04 per cent, of phosphorus, is 

 smelted in a furnace, of the Martin-Siemens 

 construction usually, and refined by metallic 

 oxides, scoria, or salts. When carbon has been 

 eliminated down to an insignificant quantity, 

 1 to 2 per cent, of ferro-manganese, contain- 

 ing 50 per cent, or over of manganese, is add- 

 ed. Ferro-silicium may be employed also. The 

 metal obtained by this simple and cheap pro- 

 cess contains 1 to 4 per cent, of phosphorus, 

 and some traces of carbon and manganese, and 

 is adapted to most of the uses to which steel 

 is put. 



Prof. Reuleaux, the director of the Gewerbe- 

 Academie of Berlin, and lat commissioner to 

 the Centennial Exhibition, has given great at- 

 tention to theoretical mechanics, and has con- 

 tributed important considerations for the under- 

 standing of the principles of mechanical mo- 

 tions. He shows that the original element* of 

 mechanisms always go in pairs, bodies allow- 

 ing each other at the same instant one single 

 motion. These pairs of elements are of two 

 orders, the simpler order, like the screw and 

 nut, hook and eye, etc., in which, when one 

 element is fixed, all the points in the other 

 traverse paths of similar geometrical form, and 

 the higher order, in which the points have 

 different but regular and mathematically de- 

 terminable paths, which often form curves of 

 great beauty. A mechanism is formed of links, 

 or bodies, generally rigid, containing elements 

 of different pairs linked together. The absolute 

 motion obtained in the mechanism depends 

 upon the particular link which is stationary 

 for the time being. The principles of the 

 direct-acting engine, the oscillating engine, tl e 

 quick-return action, and others, are demon- 

 strated to he the same, and the different forms 

 of the rotary engine are shown to be only 

 modifications of the direct-acting engine, with 

 a considerable loss of force. 1W. Keiileaux 

 has formed a collection of some thousand 

 models for the illustration of the principles of 

 mechanics. His apparatus shows how, accord- 

 ing to the theorem of Poinsot, the relative 

 motion of two bodies may be exemplified 1 y 

 the rolling of two curves upon each otl u : 

 their point of contact is the momentary centre 

 of the motion, and all the points of each curve 

 are the momentary centres of the motion cf 

 corresponding points in the other curve. A 

 number of experimental models, designed 1 y 

 Prof. Reuleaux, demonstrate how advantage- 

 ously fluids, when inclosed in proper vessels, 



