Industrial Niagara 



to spend some of it toward reducing cross sections. This pro- 1895 

 duces high velocities, but the tail-races are built of first-class ersc e 

 materials, and are set in a rock excavation. The water used 

 carries no sand, and experience has already shown that the tail- 

 races line themselves with a layer of slime in spite of the great 

 velocity in them. So long as this slime adheres to the brick and 

 to the cement joints, there can evidently be no wear of the brick 

 masonry lining. 



The wheel-pit of the Niagara Falls Power Company is a long 

 slot cut in the rock, instead of a group of small wheel-pits, and 

 to save excavation, though at the cost of some fall wasted, the 

 wheels are set on plate-girder bridges spanning the slot, and so 

 as to leave a tail-race beneath the plate girders. This tail-race, 

 or bottom of the slot, is connected by a short curve with the main 

 tail-race tunnel. 



The fashionable turbine of the present day, in the United 

 States, is, no doubt, the twin turbine, with horizontal axis, this 

 axis projecting from the wheel case, at one or both ends, and 

 either driving its attached machine directly, or carrying a pulley, 

 to belt from. Several attempts were made to fit this general form 

 of motive power for the case in hand. 



(The remainder of the article is largely taken up with a very technical 

 discussion of the turbines used at Niagara, and a comparison with turbines 

 used for water power purposes in Euorpe.) 



Le SUEUR, ERNEST A. Professor Forbes on " Harnessing Niagara." 1895 

 (Pop. sci. mo., Dec, 1895. 48198-204.) Le s 



A scathing review of Professor Forbes article on "Harnessing Niagara." 



Nikola Tesla and the electrical outlook — the new development in power 1895 

 transmission. (R. of R., Sept., 1895. 12:293-294.) 



An account of Tesla's discovery of the " rotating magnetic field." 



' The rotating magnetic field," which opened the 



way to the conversion (by means of alternating, as against the 



direct current) of electrical into mechanical energy and the 



economical transmission of power through long distances. This 



discovery forms the basis of the Niagara Company's attempt to 



utilize on a large scale Niagara Falls river. 



967 



ueur 



