420 



NA TURE 



[March 5, 1885 



and Sydney was in progress, and, on this being completed, 

 there would only remain to connect Western Australia, to have 

 the longitudes of all the chief Australian and New Zealand 

 cities and ports determined upon the same system. 



Mr. F.llery recommends that a small expedition should be 

 despatched from Melbourne to New Zealand for the observation 

 of the total eclipse of the sun on September 9 in the present 

 year, when the central line passes through Cook's Straits. Sir 

 W. Jervois, the Governor of New Zealand, had promised all the 

 aid he could render in the matter. The Board of Visitors sup- 

 ported an application to the Government of Victoria for the 

 necessary funds. [Full details of the circumstances of this 

 eclipse were given by Mr. Hind in the Monthly Notices of the 

 Royal Astronomical Society for January last.] 



ASTRONOMICAL PHENOMENA FOR THE 



WEEK, 18S5, MARCH S^4 

 (For the reckoning of time the civil day, commencing at 

 Greenwich mean midnight, counting the hours on to 24, is here 

 employed. ) 



At Greenwich on March 8 

 Sun rises, 6h. 31m. ; souths, I2h. 10m. 516s. ; sets, 17I1. 51m. ; 

 decl. on meridian, 4° 42' S. : Sidereal Time at Sunset, 

 4h. 57m. 

 Moon (at Last Quarter at 19b..) rises, ih. 5m. ; souths, 

 5h. 40m. ; sets, ioh. 12m. ; decl. on meridian, 17° 25' S. 

 Planet Rises Souths Sets Decl. on Meridian 



Phenomena of Jupiter' s Satellite. 

 March h. in. 



2 46 II. eel. reap. 

 6 12 IV. occ. disap. 



20 8 II. tr. egr. 



5 23 III. occ. disap. 



60 I. occ. disap. 



3 19 I. tr. ing. 

 5 38 I. tr. egr. 



... o 27 J. occ. disap. 

 3 14 I. eel. reap. 

 19 I III. tr. ing. 



21 45 I. tr. ing. 



22 39 III. tr. egr. 

 ..05 I. tr. egr. 



18 53 I. occ. disap. 

 21 43 I. eel. reap. 

 , of Jupiter's Satellites are such 



March 13, I9h. — Mercury in superior conjunction with the 

 Sun. 



RECENT ENGINEERING PATENTS 1 

 CIR FREDERICK BRAMWELL stated that he had been 

 determined in his choice of a subject by the consideration 

 that H.R.H. the Prince of Wales had seen fit to appoint him 

 chairman of the Executive Council of the International Inven- 

 tions Exhibition, to be held at South Kensington this year. He 

 therefore proposed to direct attention to some of those objects 

 that ought to be contributed to that Exhibition which were more 

 particularly connected with civil engineering. 



Dealing, first, with materials of construction, the President 

 remarked that probably few materials had been more generally 

 useful to the civil engineer, in works which were not of 

 metal, than Portland cement. During the last twenty-two 

 years great improvements had been made in the grinding and 

 in the quality of the cement. As regards bricks, although 

 not now superior in quality to those made by the Romans, there 

 was progress to be noted in the mode of manufacture and the 



1 Ahstract of Presidential Address at the Institution of Civil Engineers, 

 by Sir Frederick J. Braniwell, F.R.S., on January 13. 



materials employed. The brick-making machine and the 

 Hofmann kiln had economised labour and fuel, while attempts 

 were being made to utilise the waste of slate quarries. Certain 

 artificial stones appeared at last to be produced with such a 

 uniformity and power of endurance as to compare favourably 

 with the best natural stone, or were even better, for they could 

 be produced of the desired dimensions and shape, and were thus 

 ready for use, without labour of preparation. The employment 

 of wood, except in newly-developed countries, was decreasing, 

 for one reason, because it was practically impossible so to use it 

 as to obtain anything approaching to the full tensile strength. 

 Many attempts had been made to render timber proof against 

 rapid decay and ready ignition, and it was in these directions 

 alone that progress could be looked for. With respect to preser- 

 vation from fire, the wooden structures of the Health Exhibition 

 were coated with asbestos paint, and to this their escope from 

 destruction by a fire was due. Leaving the old-world materials 

 of stone and wood, attention was directed to that form of iron 

 known as steel. The President remarked that, in his judgment, 

 the making of steel in crucibles was not so satisfactory a mode 

 of obtaining uniformity in large masses as was either of the 

 other two great systems of manufacture — the Bessemer and the 

 Siemens — the two processes which had changed the whole com- 

 plexion of the iron industry. He further said that, eight years 

 ago, in a lecture he delivered at the Royal Institution, he had 

 ventured to predict that steel made by fusion would supersede 

 iron made by the puddling process, and that the use of iron so 

 made would be restricted to the small articles produced by the 

 village blacksmith. The first important revelation in steel manu- 

 facture was the ingots shown by Krupp, with other products, in 

 the Great Exhibition of 1851. These showed an enormous step 

 at the time when the production of steel involved the employ- 

 ment of the crucible. Within the last eight years a great im- 

 provement had been made by Messrs. Thomas and Gilchrist, by 

 which it had been rendered possible to employ successfully, in 

 the production of steel, iron derived from ores that, prior to the 

 date of this invention, had been found wh'lly inapplicable for 

 the purpose. In the manufacture of pig-iron improvement had 

 been effected by increasing the dimensions of the furnaces and 

 the temperature of the blast, by the better application of chemis- 

 try to the industry, by the total closing of the bottom of the 

 furnace, and by the greater use of the waste gases. Copper, 

 so long used in its alloyed condition of "gun-metal," had, 

 within the last few years, been still further improved by 

 alloying it t*ith other substances so as to produce "phosphor- 

 bronze " and " manganese-bronze," very useful materials to 

 those engaged in the construction of machinery. With the 

 increased dimensions of the main-shafts of engines, and of the 

 solid forgings for the tubes of cannon, obtaining at the present 

 day, composed, as they were, of steel, the operations of light 

 steam-hammers were absolutely harmful, and the blows of even 

 the heaviest hammers were not so efficacious as was pressure 

 applied without blow. The time was not far distant when all 

 steel in its molten state would be subjected to presusre, with 

 the object of diminishing the size of any cavities containing 

 imprisoned gases. 



Within the period under consideration the employment ol 

 testing-machines had come into the daily practice of the engineer, 

 for determining, experimentally, the various physical properties 

 of materials — and of those materials when assembled into forms 

 to resist strain, as in columns or in girders. 



In those matters which might he said to involve the principle - 

 of engineering construction, there must of necessity be but little 

 progress to note. Principles were generally very soon deter- 

 mined, and progress ensued, not by additions to the principles, 

 but by improvement in the method of giving to those principles a 

 practical shape, or by combining in one structure principles of 

 construction which had hitherto been used apart. 



Taking up, first, the subject of bridge construction — the Pre- 

 sident thought the St. Louis bridge might fairly be -aid to embody 

 a principle, novel since 1862, that of employing for the arch ribs 

 tubes composed of steel staves hooped together. Further, in 

 suspension bridges, there had been introduced the light upper 

 chain, from which were suspended the linked truss-rods, doing 

 the actual work of supporting the load, the rods being main- 

 tained in straight lines, and without flexure at their joints due t<. 

 their weight. In the East River Bridge at New York, the 

 wire cables were not made as untwisted cables, and then hoisted 

 into place, imposing severe strains upon many of the wires, but 

 the individual wires were led over from side to side, each having 



