324 Action of Iron in motion on Tempered SteeL 



very long and patiently continued, end in inventions of con- 

 siderabte public utility." 



In reference to the sentiments expressed in this paragraph, 

 I am willing to state, that I do claim the right (in common 

 with others) to set bounds to the efforts of invention. Can 

 the writer of the article in the North American Review in- 

 vent a right a'ngled plane triangle, whose three angles shall 

 not be equal to two right angles? Can he invent a steam- 

 engine that shall be able '0 impart to the appending ma- 

 chinery more power than is applied ? It is now established 

 that all d©uble stroke engines do impart to the appending 

 machinery all the power that is applied, and consequently a 

 saving of power can only be effected by the invention of a 

 machine that shall impart more power than is applied to it : 

 and this, in the judgment of the writer of this reply, is not 



possible. 



A. B. QUINBY. 



New-York, Nov. 1, 1824. 



Note. In my note to my demonstration of the Crank 

 Problem, I wrote the words, " reciprocating motion produced 

 by, the crankJ^ This is an error. It should be, rotary mo- 

 tion produced by the crank, 



A, B. Q, 



Art. XVI. — On the action of Iron in motion on Tempered 

 SteeL By MM Dakier and Colladon,* 



The manner in which steel is cut by soft iron, as ascer- 

 tained by Mr. Barnes, has been pointed out, p. 155 of our 

 last volume ; and since then the effect has been attributed to 

 the softening of the steel at the Doiut of contact by the lieat 

 resulting from the friction. The foMovving experiments and re- 

 sults, in relation to this subject, are extracted from a raemoire 

 published in th;- Bib, Umv. xxv. p. 283 



The authors of the paper were led to doubt the sufficiency. 

 of the reason above given, by finding, on an examination of 

 tUe iron plate made use of to cut some steel, that its edge 



* From the Lond^.n Quarterly Jsarnal for October 1824. 



