Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1873-04-03
The Economy Of Fuel.

merit at his business That which is true
IF steam engines and furnaces is equally
true of our household stoves; and one
housekeeper will manage to get along, and
do equally as good work, with from one
half to one fourth less fuel than is con
sumed by others. Now, the faculty which
enables some to economist fuel Is, In a
great measure an art, that is to say, 1T
depends upon experience ana the skill
which arises from manual deXterlty; Dut
| it is also a science and may be acquired by
careful study of the principles winch
| govern combustion and the distribution
of heat; and these are by no means dill
cult to comprehend.
An important circumstance connected
with fuel in relation to its efficiency is its
condition as regards moisture, and the
action of the atmosphere. Coal or wood
that has absorbed moisture is not only
disagreeable, but very uneconomlcai.
Numerous carefully conducted expert
ments show that it requires one pound OF
coal to evaporate fourteen pounds OF wa
ter, while one pound Of wood evaporates
seven pounds of water. If therefore our
wood pile, or our coal bin, should be ex-
posed to rain or snow so as to ABSORB
| moisture, this moisture must be all evapo-
rated and carried up the chimney as steam
by the heat produced by the burning fuel,
and this heat is OF course just SO much
wasted that otherwise might be made use
full.
But the loss arising from the fact that
to get rid of all moisture requires heat, is
not the only item of loss arising from
| such exposure. It has now been very
fully demonstrated that exposure to air
and moisture causes, in both coal and
| yunoH rt of clnyu hI1 Of ion which
lessons their efficiency by from ten to
thirty per cent. One Of the first points
then that demands our attention is the
careful preservation of fuel from atmos-
pheric influences To use it in damp
condition involves great waste; but it is
not enough that coal and wood be dry at
the time they are used-they must be
kept constantly dry during the whole
period of their storage. This fact is fully
recognized by railway companies, who
always keep their wood carefully covered,
and purchasers of coal and wood would do
we'll to see that the fuel which they buy has
been properly kept. Coal taken from a
heap that has been exposed for months to
the elements, is not as valuable, weight
for weight, as coal that has been well kept.
Having taken proper care in this mat
ter, the next point is to see that the fuel
is properly and completely burned. We
| do not by this refer to the mere escape of
a few cinders through the crate, for these
may be recovered by the use of a com
mon screen. The | IS of fuel which
arises from that imperfect combination
that carries our coal and wood up the
chimney before they have given out more
than half the heat that they are
capable of giving out, far exceeds
any small loss occasioned by the
existence of cinders in the ash
heap; and among those who are ignorant
Of. the phenomena which occur during
the combustion Of coal the source of this
loss is never so much as suspected. We
do not always remember that of all the
tons of coal and cords of wood that we
buy, the entire quantity, with the eXcep-
| ton of a few pounds of ashes passes up
the chimney in perfectly invisible form.
The small amount of smoke that we see
forms but very small part of the fuel
that is actually consumed, and may be
safely left out of the calculation. Coal
and wood are both composed of charcoal,
or coke combined with certain combusti-
BILE gases-tAe carbon or charcoal form
ing however, the largest portion of our
fuel. When this carbon is fully saturated
with the oxygen of the air it forms
| dense, Invisible gas, generally known as
carbonic acid. TO produce this gas there
are required six pounds of charcoal and
sixteen pounds CT oxygen, and to furnish
this amount of oxygen no less than
eighty pounds of air are needed. But it
happens that carbon forms another COM
| pound containing but half the quantity
of oxygen that carbonic acid does. This
is known as carbonic oxide-an invisible
gas which burns freely with pale blue
flame that is often seen Pickering over
the bed of red hot Goals in our stoves,
after all the gas that was originally con-
tanned in the coal has been driven off.
This blue flame is often supposed to be
| the flame of burning sulphur but in al
most all cases it is due to carbonic oxide,
and is in reality the Returning of half
| burned fuel. When thus re- burned the
fuel gives out just as much heat as it did
| In its first conclusions; and hence, if we
allow it to escape in half burned condi-
ton we incur the loss of just onehalf the
heat that we ought to get. And as the
fuel is perfectly invisible while in this
half burned condition we are very apt to
let this drain proceed without our MOTTO
ing it.
The proper remedy for this difficulty is
the admission of full supply of air and
the use of thin beds Of fuel Where the
fuel lies in deep masses through which
the air has to force its way, the gases con
tinue to dissolve the fuel as they pass up
wards through it, and then they carry it
Oft. When brisk fire is needed, see that
the draft is free and that the coal is even
ly disposed in a thin layer over the CRATE.
Where it is absolutely necessary to have
a deep bed of coal, economy demands the
use of some form of what are known as
gas-burning stoves, in which stream of
hot air is poured into the stove Adore the
fuel, and thus the complete combustion
OF the half burned but gaseous coal is
insured.
But it is possible to commit as great an
error, on the other hand, by admitting
too much air. We have lust stated that
six pounds Of coal require eighty pounds
of air for their complete combustion
This is large quantity, but if we allow
| twice as much air to pass in as is needed,
| then for every six pounds of coal that we
| use, we raise eighty pounds Of air from
the temperature of the room to about 400
degs., and then let it go off, carrying all
| this heat with it. This is Just about the
same thing as if, for every six pounds of
coal, We were to raise ten gallons of water
to the boiling point and then throw it
| out doors. The proper remedy for this is