Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1868-1875, 1872-08-07
ARTIFECIAL FUEL.
How O Nashville MAN Is Progressing
EarEa IS ~ With lYfN Inveu ti0x HFs n 1

How O Nashville MAN is Progressing
ZSEEl - ~ with lsis Invention.
| Our citizens will remember the expert
ments made in this city on coal dust by Mr..
e. T. Loiseau, q year OF SO past. We notice
from the Mauch Chunk Coal Gazette that
he is determined to carry his process for
making artificial fuel to successful termin-
alton. From the paper above mentioned
we extract the following:
The Anthracite Fuel Manufacturing
Company, Incorporated in 1869, erected, at
Gesqnehoning, on the property of the Lee
high Coal and Navigation Company, large
works with powerful machinery to manu-
facture artificial fuel from anthracite coal
dust by using as cement raw coal tar. The
cost of these works was very near $l00, 900.
The process was something similar to the
one used in Paris for the manufacture of
what is known as Charlton de Parts, and
which is a mixture of charcoal dust, saw
dust, and raw coal tar. The result was a
failure; the heavy pressure required TO con
solidate the coal expelled the hydrogen,
which is necessary in coal to insure combus-
ton, and the fuel thus manufactured would
not burn; besides, the cost of manufactE-
ing was too great. Y
The readers of the CodI Gdzette will re-
member that in our number Of Jan. II,
ofthis year, we published in fuii very IA
vorable report of the Committee Cd Science
and Arts of the Franklin Institute of Phila-
delphia, on an artificial fuel presented for
examination by E. F. Loiseau, Of that city.
This report was published and commented
upon by all the scientific papers, by all the
coal papers, and by most of the widely cir
culated- daily -papers.-4F'he process of MFR.
Loiseau attracted considerable attention on
account of its simplicity, its practicability,
and above AL its cheapness. This process
is an old one; known and in operation in
Belgium since 1859. Coal dust is mixed
with yellow clay, pressed into Jumps and
dried. By the most improved methods in
Europe, the proportion of clay is still TWEEN
ty per cent, and the fuel disintegrates by
rain. Mr.. Loiseau has reduced the proper
ton of clay to seven per cent, but the origi-
nality OF this gentleman's invention, what
constitutes its greatest merit, is that the
fuel manufactured by his process is render
ed imperyious to moisture by an outside
coating of resin dissolved in benzine, so that
said fuel can lose none of its combustible
qualities by long exposure to the weather,
and does not need to be placed under
cover.
Through the negotiations of Mr.. Loiseau,
the Lehigh Coal and Navigation Company
has become proprietor of the works of the
Anthracite Fuel Manufacturing Company,
in order to test the merits of Mr.. Loiseau's
process by experimenting on large scale.
Although the machinery is very defective,
Mr.. Loiseau believes that by making few
alterations and adding some other ma chin
cry, he will be able to manufacture an
amount of fuel large enough to be tested in
blast furnaces, rolling mills, pudding fur
naces, stationary engines, locomotives,
stoves, CRATES, and ranges, so that not the
ichtest doubt will exist about the prac
ticability OF his process. The experiments
will require about two months, and, if they
are successful, the company intends to erect
large works at their new screen-bouse, TO
manufacture daily from 500 to 1000 tons
of artificial fuel by Mr.. Loiseau's process.
We cannot but commend the enterprising
spirit of the Lehigh Coal and Navigation
Company, and offer TO her able officers and
to Mr.. Loiseau our most sincere wishes
for the complete success of their undertake
ing.
judging from all appearances, the prob
lem which has puzzled all practical and sci
entifc minds for number OF years, the
utilization of anthracite coal-dust, is very
near its solution.