The herald and mail. [volume] (Columbia, Tenn.) 1873-188?, 1874-12-04
NEW MOTOR.
Liquid Carb0nio Acid a Substitute for
Saehm.

Liquid Carb0nio Acid a Substitute for
| Steam.
| The interesting announcement OF q
/ substitute for steam as motive power
has been recently made in Germany,
from a source entitled to q hearing.
The rapid consumption of the earth's
fuel supply and the drain on It's forests,
| attended by so many disastrous con-
sequences, have stimulated scientific in
ventors TO find successor for steam,
and it is to be hoped the present dis
covery will prove q success. The new
motor is carboleum, and its application
to machinery is claimed for Or. Beins,
Of OroninSen, who has devoted many
years to its study and utilization. Ex-
pertinent first taught him that when the
bicarbonate of sodium is heated in
closed space, at @ temperature of eight
hundred degrees Fahrenheit, liquid car
bonic acid is distilled ont of it, having
the expansive force of fifty or sixty at
nnospheres. Carboleum is not dangerous
as an explosive, and the fact that thus
employed, as the German inventor pro-
poses, it is possessed of enormous mo-
tive power, was attested by scientific
men tt whom the experiments we're
shown. The heat required TO bring out
this motive power of the carbonic acid
N the new earboleum engine is appar-
emily very small when compared with
that requisite for producing a high
pressure of steam in the ordinary en-
gine. In the former il is only three
pounds of coal per hour for each horse
power represented by the engine-an
amount so small that it would b. I'M
necessary in ships driven by the new
process to devote much space for fuel.
The chief value of the invention, how
ever, is claimed to be its practicability
in large factories. The author thinks
that for the great industries the car
boleum engine can, in nearly every in
stance, take the place of steam.
The scientific value of this discovery
is immense, if mechanical ingenuity can
successfully apply it in the directions
indicated by DR.. Beins. If it is said
that the supply of carboleum is not as
plentiful as that element from which
steam is made it may be answered it is
almost as large as that of coal in some
parts of the world. Carboleum is found
inexhaustibly in the beds of common
chalk in all parts Of the earth. As COM
mon chalk contains carbonic acid to the
amount of half its weight it will yield
double its volume of carboleum. Aud
the chalk resources of the earth are
vast beyond computation.
It is evident, therefore, that the pro-
posed successor of steam, if mechani- !
cally applied, would be used over the
larger part of the world as an invalu-
able auxiliary of steam. with an enor-
nous economy of coal and wood. The |
successful introduction of such a motive |
power, minimizing the fuel consump- |
tioD, would be boon OF incalculable !
importance in the manufactures and |
arts. That the principle upon which !
its Introduction is claimed TO be feasible !
is scientifically correct seems hardly to
be doubted. If the immeasurable chalk
beds are stored with mechanical energy,
as we know the coal beds are, the
anxiety of physicists and economists,
lest the worlds fuel supply may fall
short in the lapse of few centuries, is
dissipated. The utilization of the new
fuel would give an impetus TO all indus
tries, and might revolutionize the COM
merce of manufacturing nations whose
wealth and political power are mainly
due to their coal supplies.