422 



HOLLY SYSTEM OF STEAM-HEATING. 



blesorae method of heating houses than those 

 now in use. It will furnish steam-power for 

 machinery in any required amount, at any 

 desired moment, more cheaply and with great- 

 er safety than manufacturers can supply them- 

 selves ; tlie steam can be used for laundry 

 purposes, and perhaps soon a method will be 

 devised for utilizing it in the different opera- 

 tions of cookery; it can furnish a constant 

 supply of heat at an equable temperature for 

 greenhouses and forcing-houses. Not the 

 least of its benefits, as has been already expe- 

 rienced in Lockport, is that it can keep the 

 water-hydrants from freezing in severe weath- 

 er, and can afford an ever-ready supply of 

 steam-power for the extinguishment of fires. 

 In the heating of dwellings the greater health- 

 fulness and cleanliness of the mode over any 

 other are important considerations, and also 

 the reduction in care and labor and in the 

 risks of fire. 



The details of the invention, as applied in 

 the Lockport works, are described by Mr. Hol- 

 ly in his specifications as follows : 



1. AH underground steam street main in combina- 

 tion with steam-supplying apparatus, and with a 

 meter constructed to control the pressure of steam in 

 a building, and also record the consumption of steam 

 from such main. 2. Junction-boxes admitting ex- 

 pansion and contraction of mains longitudinally, 

 and \vith heat-radiators in the buildings. 3. A 

 steam-meter to control the pressure and record the 

 consumption of steam in tha building. 4. Heat- 

 radiators. 5. Steam-trap. 6. Steam-trap and re- 

 heater. 7. Water-hydrant. 8. A street steam-hy- 

 drant. 9. Steam automatic regulator or governor. 

 19. Snow and ice reservoirs having open-ended or 

 perforated steam-pipes for escape of steam therein. 

 11 and 12. Expansion chamber, hood, lorin pipe 

 and expansion chamber. 18. Adjustable ring. 14. 

 Junction box and outer covering of steam main. 

 15. Section of steam main made of nickel-plated 

 metal. 16. Convex ring, wall of expansion-cham- 

 ber, eye-bolts. 17. Steam street main, isolated and 

 drained by tile. 18. Meter details. 19. Eadiators, 

 adjustable. 20. Spring clutch and pencil forger and 

 valve-stem. 21. Conducting and steam pipes having 

 a coil and connecting chamber. A contrivance or 

 contrivances for supplying steam for warming dis- 

 tricts of dwelling-houses in cities and towns, and 

 for " driving' 1 machinery and for other driving pur- 

 poses in said districts, consisting of steam-supplying 

 apparatus, street mains having heavy expansion- 

 junction service-boxes, service-pipes, having con- 

 necting pipes and meters. Connected with these 

 several appliances are a boiler-house and stack, four 

 boiler* with heaters for feed-water, 2,900 feet 4 

 L n ^ h A 6 *' 4 ' 600 feet 3 inches, 4,400 feet 2i inches, 

 7,310 feet 2 inches, 1,700 feet H inch, and 1,300 feet 

 or U-inch wrought-iron pipes or street mains. 

 e pipes or mains are first coated with asbestus 

 and covered with a jacket of cow-hair felting or other 

 ion-conducting substance, which is protected with 

 hard-wood strips secured with copper wire, and tho 

 Pipes thus prepared are inserted in logs of wood 

 1 BO as to leave an air-chamber around the 

 pipes, and then the whole structure laid to a grade 



SS^&TVS! 1 ^ tile - dl ' ains - At intervals of 

 about 100 feet the junction-boxes, with hoods and 

 service-pipe connections and nickel-plated movable 

 re inserted in a well of masonry 2* feet 

 square, which give ready aocess at all times to their 



The boiler-house in Lockport is constructed 

 for six boilers. Three were put up, but only 

 one or two used at a time the first win- 

 ter. Two were horizontal, 5 by 16 feet in 

 dimensions. The consumption of coal was 2 

 to 3 tons daily. The total length of pipe 

 through which the steam was conveyed was 

 3 miles. The largest main, 6 inches in di- 

 ameter, branches into two 4-inch pipes a short 

 distance from the boiler, and these are divided 

 after running some distance into two 3-inch 

 pipes, and they again into the smallest pipes 

 of 1| inch diameter. The junction-service 

 boxes, placed along the whole line of the mains 

 at a distance of 100 feet or more, provide for 

 the longitudinal contraction and expansion of 

 the pipes, and at the same time afford a space 

 for the apparatus for distributing the steam. 

 A hood on the head of the service-pipe in the 

 junction-box collects the water of condensa- 

 tion, and conveys it into the house to a valve, 

 where it is wiredrawn, and by such reduction 

 of pressure, at its temperature, which corre- 

 sponds to a pressure of 50 Ibs. per square inch, 

 is reconverted in great part into steam and 

 conveyed into the radiators. The pressure of 

 the steam as served to the radiators is 2 or 3 

 Ibs. per square inch. 



The combined meter and regulator both 

 registers and measures out the supply in the 

 houses. A valve, of the character of the 

 slide-valve in a high-pressure engine, admits 

 the steam from the street main into a short 

 pipe, at the end of which is a similar valve, 

 which admits it into the radiators. The pres- 

 sure on both sides of the valves is shown by 

 steam-gauges. Connected with this regulating 

 apparatus is the indicator, which records the 

 consumption in figures, showing its value in 

 dollars and cents. 



Mr. Holly estimates that 15,000,000 cubic 

 feet can be warmed with ten boilers, 16 feet 

 long and 5 feet in diameter, with 54 tubes 

 23 inches in diameter. This would make the 

 total heating surface 11,360 cubic feet, giving 

 1,300 cubic feet as the space to be warmed by 

 every foot of heating surface. Experiments 

 made regarding the loss by condensation 

 showed that it amounted in 1,600 feet of 3- 

 inch pipe, with a pressure of 18 Ibs., to 9 Ibs. 

 of coal per hour ; in an ordinary city street 

 that length of pipe could furnish 100 consum- 

 ers, giving 2-16 Ibs. of coal per day as each 

 one's share in the loss from this cause. It 

 was found that when the supply was cut off" 

 from the boiler, it required 18 minutes for the 

 pressure to fall from 60 to 45 Ibs. ; 28 minutes 

 for it to decline from 45 to 30 Ibs., or from 4 

 to 3 atmospheres ; 40 minutes for it to fall to 

 15 Ibs., and 54 minutes longer for it to sink to 

 the pressure of the atmosphere ; or 2 hours 20 

 minutes to condense the four atmospheres of 

 pressure. The comparison of the different 

 sizes of pipe with respect to their capacity for 

 conveying steam and their loss by condensa- 

 tion shows that the latter increases in a direct 



