Nashville patriot. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1858-1860, 1859-07-02
TheLubrtcat,ur or machinery.

The simplest appearing invention often
proves the most valuable. There are many
apparently ulimportant items of waste
about machinery which, If suffered to continue
will, in time. prove quite disastrous. The
great art and tact in any business, is to watch
it's small points, to stop the tiny leaks that are
constantly occurring, wearing 1awaV the
profits, and frequently causing the failure of
important enterprises. Such Is the case in
the speciality we are now treating-that of
the lubricating of machinery, The improve
ment is styled ''Bryan's Improved Lubrica-
ting Process for Rolling Mills" and is an
operation at the Licking Iron Works, across
the river in Covington.
In the rolling mill the fabrication is es-
teemed asmall item, when compared with the
breakage of the rolls and the wear and tear
of the brasses or bearings. but these impor-
tant matters have both been duly considered
and involved in planning this improved lubri-
eating process; and as far as experiments
have been made, the difficulties seem to have
been satisfactorily overcome. There is no
thing new in the structure of the rolling ma
chinery, but the improvement consists in a
method of so lubricating the journals of the
rolls, and regulating their temperature by
the application of a stream of heated water
that they are not nearly so liable to break as
by the use of cold water, or the ordinary lu-
blicators. This application of heat 70 the
journals would, at first thought, seem unten.
able as an Improvement, but when it is re-
membersd that the body of the rolls must Of
necessity have its temperature increased by
the heated metal, it seems very evident thai
the journals should also be heated to about
the same temperature, or they will give way
! and break off, not from pressure, but from
the contraction and expansion of the metal
The record of such fractures seems also to
prove this position. since il is well known to
those engaged in the business, that the rolls
break almost invariably at the neck of the
journals. This is said to be almost always
the place of fracture when stream of coid
water is used, but not so frequently when
other lubricators are applied, which permit
the journals to become warmer and more
nearly the temperature of the body Of the
roll. To meet this difficulty, pipe is intro
duced along the sill of the machinery SO as
to be out OF the way, and connects it with a
tank into which the escape steam from the
engine is admitted, so as to heat the wafer 10
any desired temperature. This pipe has two
branch pipes. connecting with it, and eXten-
ding up by the side of the housings. and
curved over the journals of the upp-r roll,
so as TO conduct the heated water directly
upon them. These branch pipes have each
regulating cocks, by which the flow of water
may be increased or diminished at pleasure,
and it is evident that, by this arrangement,
the temperature of the journals may be
varied as the body OF The roll varies.
1t is maintained by many practical ma
chinists and engineers that water when
heated is better lubricator than when cold,
and that machinery will run lighter with it.
By this process, we should think the saving
of grease vas important; there is also evil
IDENTIFY 1t saving of time. The Licking Works
state their saving in the first item to be as 3
to l over old modes; and in wear and tear OF
brasses, $500 per annum. The housing
rolls, boxes, or bearings, &C., do not differ IN
form from the ordinary mills; therefore, this
improvement can be eas.lv adjusted. Letters
patent have been secured both in this and
foreign countries, and we understand the in
vention is TO be made known by competent
person to the iron workers beyond the At
lantic.-Cm. Gaz