94 



SCIENCE. 



[Vol. XIII. No. 314 



an arrangement of levers and rods, the lowest type in the corre- 

 sponding groove of the composing-cylinder is pushed radially out- 

 wards on to a very rapidly revolving disk, which carries it to an 

 opening in the stationary guard surrounding the disk, and delivers it 

 upon a moving belt, on which the types are carried in their proper 

 order to a revolving lifter, which raises them m succession into a 

 long setting-stick in front of the operator, terminating in a justifying- 

 stick at the upper end of an inclined channel or galley. 



In justifying, a section of the composed line of type is drawn to 

 the mouth of the justifying-stick, and is justified with spaces taken 

 from a case containing channels for the different spaces and the 

 hyphen, the lowest of which are pushed partially out by ejectors 

 worked with a treadle. 



The lines of type, when ready for distribution, are inserted in the 

 grooves of the distributing-cylinder from a special galley by means 

 of a slide, with which a whole line at a time is pushed bodily into a 

 groove. 



It is claimed that this machine will distribute and set at the rate 

 of six thousand ems per hour, doing, with three persons, the work 

 of six men working in the ordinary way. Considering the purpose 

 for which the machine is intended, the construction is simple, and 

 there appears to be no difficulty or hitch in the working. 



It should be remarked, that, by manipulating the keys in one 

 direction only, several keys may be touched simultaneously without 

 risk of the characters becoming transposed. In working the oppo- 

 site way, each key must be touched separately. The machine is 

 driven from a shaft by two small belts. One belt transmits motion 

 to the revolving disk below the type-setting cylinder and to the type- 

 lifter ; while the other belt, by means of a tightening-puUey and 

 ratchet-gear, produces the step-by-step motion of the distributing- 

 cylinder. 



THE STEAM-ENGINE, ITS PRINCIPLES, ITS DEVELOP- 

 MENT, ITS PRESENT CONDITION, AND ITS FU- 

 TURE PERFECTION.! 



In this lecture will be found, stated in a very compact form, the 

 fundamental principles of the steam-engine, and a history of its devel- 

 opment. Some of the statements at first glance seem very startling, 

 but they are so supported by the records that surprise is overcome 

 by conviction. One of these statements is, that " for a generation 

 after James Watt's death the art of producing power from fuel by 

 the intervention of a steam-engine retrograded ; so that less power 

 was usually obtained from a pound of coal consumed than had 

 been obtained by the use of methods invented and fully explained 

 by James Watt." 



This is illustrated by the following : " Founded upon these 

 principles, the steam-engines which were made by Mr. Watt and 

 his associates and pupils. before 1830, produced a horse-power with 

 less than two pounds of coal an hour. These engines are known as 

 the Cornish pumping-engines ; and, if you will look into the history 

 of these machines, you will find them reported as doing more than 

 a 'hundred millions of duty,' which is a technical phrase, intended 

 to express the fact that a hundred million pounds of water were 

 lifted a foot high for a hundredweight of coal consumed. Turn- 

 ing that into horse-power, it means about two pounds of coal an 

 hour a horse-power. This result was produced by cutting off 

 steam in the cylinders at one-sixth or one-eighth of the stroke, and 

 allowing it to expand six or eight times. The engines of that day, 

 of course, were very imperfectly constructed, and great losses oc- 

 curred from leaking pistons and from defective boilers ; but, not- 

 withstanding that loss, the result was equal to two pounds of coal 

 an hour a horse-power." 



In a note on the subject, reference is made to the authorities 

 showing the " duty " of Cornish engines before 1830 to be more 

 than a " hundred millions," or, what is the same thing, a horse- 

 power with less than two pounds of coal an hour. Perhaps the 

 contrast between the engines did not attract much attention, 

 because the Cornish engine's economy was always stated in terms 

 of weight lifted, whereas economy in other engines was stated in 

 terms of coal an hour a horse-power. 



1 Abstract of a lecture delivered by Edward N. Dickerson, LL.D., before the 

 Electric Club of New York, Jan. 17, 1889. 



The lecturer, on this subject, makes this statement: "When 

 steamships came to be built in England in 1840, and afterwards, 

 notwithstanding the fact that high expansion with great economy 

 was in constant operation on James Watt's Cornish engines and 

 on Wolff's compound engines, no attempt was made to work the 

 marine engines under high expansion ; and as a consequence all 

 the earlier steamships, for more than thirty years, were running at 

 a cost of at least four pounds of coal an hour a horse-power ; 

 while, at the same time, compound engines had been well known 

 for a generation, and were in actual use, making a horse-power for 

 about two pounds of coal an hour. The Cunard Company, how- 

 ever, were making money in their business ; and they considered 

 that a sufficient answer to any suggestion that their fuel account 

 was enormously expensive." 



It is certainly a very remarkable fact that for a generation 

 steamship-owners did not use high expansion on their ship-engines, 

 when it had been in use on shore for thirty years, both in single 

 and in compound engines. 



The fact, perhaps, is not generally known, as stated by the lec- 

 turer, that " in 1825 several steamboats on the North River worked 

 by double expansion engines, were built by Mr. Allaire, in this city, 

 — the ' Henry Eckford ' for one ; and the ' Sun,' which made the 

 trip to Albany in about twelve hours, for another. At that time 

 the subject was not well enough understood, and economy in fuel 

 was not considered of so much consequence as the first cost of 

 construction, and these engines were not largely reproduced. One 

 of these double expansion engines made in England was brought 

 to this country in 1830, and for many years was used in the oil- 

 factory of Judd's Sons, giving very economical results. When 

 they needed more power, a half-stroke cut-off engine was made for 

 that factory and added to the other, but its results were vastly in- 

 ferior to that of the compound engine." 



The explanation isprobably the true one, that the greater original 

 cost of compound engines was of more consequence in those days 

 than subsequent economy ; and so the compound engines were , 

 neglected and lost sight of, till attention was again called to them 

 by Mr. Jameson in i860, when it was necessary to save a steamship 

 company on the Pacific Ocean from ruin, because of the high cost 

 of fuel there ; and he adopted the very obvious remedy of reducing 

 coal-consumption one-half by the use of the old compound engines, 

 which had been disregarded for years. 



One very interesting fact brought prominently forward is thus 

 stated : " The astonishing fact exists to-day, that, on an average, every 

 steamboat running on the waters of New York is wasting certainly 

 not less than fifteen per cent of all the fuel consumed, by leaking 

 through the valves ; and almost any one of them will run at the 

 rate of four or five miles an hour without ever opening the steam- 

 valves at all, and simply by the leakage through those valves ; and 

 yet that leakage is only the difference between what leaks in 

 through the steam-valves and what leaks out through the exhaust- 

 valves. Some of these steamboat-engines are so constructed that 

 the engineer can 'unhook ' the steam-valves without unhooking the 

 exhaust-valves; so that, as the ^engine moves, the exhaust- valves 

 are working, and the steam-valves are shut. That is particularly 

 true of some of the steamboat-engines on the New Haven line ; 

 and when the pilot rings the slow-bell, as he frequently must do in 

 going through the crowded thoroughfares, the engineer simply un- 

 hooks the steam-valves and lets them drop shut, and the steam- 

 boat moves on at a fair rate of speed from the leakage alone ; 

 whereas, if those steam-valves were tight, the engine would be 

 stopped in half a revolution. This tremendous loss is not appre- 

 ciated, because it is a case of internal hemorrhage, and no visible 

 sign appears. The steam leaks into the condenser, and is pumped 

 overboard with the condensing water ; but, as far as I have ob- 

 served, it has not raised the temperature of Long Island Sound at 

 all, and therefore has not produced any effect on climate ; and 

 there is no advantage gained by that tremendous expenditure. The 

 remedy, of course, is very simple, and that is to go back to James 

 Watt, which would mean at least fifteen per cent of saving m the 

 coal -bins." 



A note very fully explains how this loss occurs, and why it es- 

 capes observation. All the earlier steamboats used the single 

 puppet-valves of James Watt, which are necessarily perfectly tight 



