Massachusetts spy and Worcester advertiser. [volume] ([Worcester, Mass.]) 1823-1825, 1823-10-08
CHE arta a1r0 Scfe1trfs.
On Perkins New hvention in Steam
Engines.

A very ingenious mechanic says, he has
discovered new powers in water, by which he
can work steam engine at one tenth of its
present expenditure; though every feature
OF his supposed invention has been tried over
and over again, above twenty years ago, and
failed, from being upon mistaken principles.
He says, he discovered ID D steamboat on
the Mississippi, that steam at high pressure
is comparatively cold; and that experiments
have been now made, which tend to explain
the cause of this phenomenon. desire TO
tell him, that this fact was universally known
among the scientific ia London twenty-five
years ago, and probably long before that time.
lie tells us too, that, by throwing. high
pressure steam into another boiler, we can
save nine-tenths Of the coal which this boiler
would otherwise consume !; in reply to this,
say, that fifteen years since, myself and NV
family. put up boiler on purpose to try this
experiment on a large scale; and it totally
failed, by consuming one-third more coal, than
1t it had been burnt under the working boiler
IN the usual way; and have since seen it
tried by several others, with equal success,
He next talks Of condensing under the press
ure Of 7Olbs. to the inch, when the most that
can by any possibility be gained, by conden-
sation is 14lbs. He therefore confesses loss
of 56lbs. besides the mistake from the fact,
that ten times his pressure would not condense
three atoms of steam; he also supposes that
he Grams the insterstices between the particles
OF water, in his full boiler, with caloric. 50
full, he says, that steam cannot have room to
generate, and therefore there is no steam until
the water is IN its passage to the cylinder :
now never knew water escape from boiler
but 1t retained its character of water; or
steam, but it inclined to become water.
will endeavor to state my sentiments upon
the nature Of steam, and the more, as it will
assist to explain my argument. Water, sepa-
rated into parts, becomes steam; separated
still further, it becomes gas and the operation
still pursued, the gas becomes divided into its
prImeval atoms; the motion or decomposing
principle, occasioning steam to the pressure Of
2lb. to the inch, appears to be the period at
which water gives out the greatest sensation
OF heat; and, as the operation goes on, heat
is less and less perceptible, until the steam or
gas perfectly decomposed) becomes (like
consumed coal or ashes) comparatively cold
If the boiler were, what Mr.. Perkins thinks it
to be, magazine of caloric, which caloric
comes in freely through its bottom, the water
offering less impeachment to its passage; how
comes it to stay there in terrific pressure, obe-
dient to his will, without passing as quickly
through its top or sides? Denying heat to be
an element, and declaring steam to be de-
composed water, consider it impossible for
MIR: Perkins to get 5OOlbs. pressure in his
boiler, or regeneration, except by the decompo-
sitlon of the water in it. If the water, then,
]: decomposible in any degree by the opera
ton OF fire, the boiler must burst before the
pressure is at one quarter what he proposes to
work his engine at, because he has no room
TOR its expansion. Again, water when Just
broken into steam is easily condensed, or
united to water again; but when broken to its
elementary atoms, it is not in human power
to bring it again to water in any reasonable or
useful time.
The result of similar experiments, tried
nearly thirty years ago, is, that high pressure
engine can only be worked, with economy, at
49lbS. TO the inch; and condensing one, at
2lbs.: ten times his imagined power has been
long since discovered, and obtainable with
double his assumed economy. To regulate
this enormous power, is the only desideratum
in mechanics to which ingenious men are
looking forward. Nep Monthly Magazine.