The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1881-07-23
The Storing OF Electricity.

Sir William Thomson, of the Glasgow
University, has written the followT;nm".
letter, concerning the storing of elas
tricity, to the London Times:
SIR: The marvellous 'sbox of elect,;o
ity', described in letter to YOU. wb;oh
was published in the Times of Nav lie
has been subjected to a variety of trial.
and measurement in my laboratory fo,.
now three weeks, and l think it may in
terest your readers to learn that the 70
suits show your correspondent to have
been by no means too enthusiastic as II
its greats practical value. 1 am contin.
uing my experiments to learn the he
havior of the Faure battery in varied
circumstances, and to do what can To-
ward finding the best way of arranging
it for the different kinds of service t0
which it is to be applied. At the re-
quest of the Conseil d'Administration Of
the Societe de la Force ct la Lumiere. 7
have gladly undertaken this work, be-
cause the subject is one in which l feel
intensely interested, seeing in it reali-
cation of the most ardently and unceas-
ingly felt scientific aspiration of my life
AN aspiration which 1 scarcely dared
to expect, or to hope to live to see rea-
lized.
The problem of converting energy in
60 preservable and storable form, and
of laying it up in store conveniently for
allowing it to be used at any time when
wanted, is one of the most interesting
and important in the whole range Of
science. 1t is solved on small scale in
winding up watch, in drawing bowl
:. COMPRISING air into the receiver of "a
sirgun, or of Whitehead torpedo, in
winding up the weights of a clock or
other machine driven by weights, and in
pumping up water to height by a
windmill-or otherwise, as in Sir Will
liam Armstrong; hydraulic accumulator
for the purpose of using it afte'ward to
do work by waterwheel or waer press
ure on piston. 1t is solved on a large
scale by the application of burning fuel
to smelt zinc, to be afterwa'd used to
give electric light or to drivs an electro
magnetic engine by becoming, as it
were, unsmelted in a votaic battery.
Ever since Joule, forty years ago,
founded the thermodynanic theory of
the voltaic battery and the electro-mag-
netic engine, the idea Of applying the
engine to work the battery backward,
and thus restore the chemical energy to
the materials so that they may again act
voltaically, and again and again, has
been familiar in science. But with all
ordinary forms of volbic battery the re-
alization of the idea to any purpose
seemed hopelessly distant. BY Plante's
admirable discovery OF the lead and pc
royide of lead voltaic battery, alluded to
by your correspondent, an important
advance toward the desired object was
made twenty years ago; and now by M.
Faure's improvement practical fruition
is attained.
The " million of foot hounds" kept in
the box during its sevelty-two hours
journey from Paris to Glasgow was no
exaggeration. One of the four cells, af-
ter being discharged, was recharged
again by its own laboratory battery, and
then left to itself absolutely undisturbed
for ten days. After that it yielded to me
two hundred and sixty thousand foot
pounds Cor little more than a quarter
of million. This not only confirms
M. Reynier's measurements, on the
faith of which your correspondents
statement was made; it seems further,
to show that the waste of stored energy
by time is not great, and that for DAYS
or weeks, at all events, it may not be of
practicable moment. This, however, is
q question which can only be answered
by careful observations and measure
ments carried on for a month longer
time than have hitherto had for inves-
tigating the Faure battery. l have al
ready ascertained enough regarding its
qualities to make it quite certain that it
solves the problem of storing electric
energy in 3 manner and on scale use.
full for many important practical appli-
cations. 1t has already had in this
country one interesting application, of
the smallest in respect to dvnamical
energy used, but not the smallest in re-
spect to beneficence, of all that may be
expected OF it. A few days ago, my
colleague, Prof. George Buchanan, car
ried away from my laboratory one of the
lead cells (weighing about eighteen
pounds) in his carriage, and by it ignited
the thick platinum wire of a gaIyanic
ecrosear and bloodlessly removed nav-
old tumor from the tongue of q Young
boy in about a minute of time. The
operation would have occupied over ten
minutes if performed by the ordinary
chain ecrdSeur, as it must have been had
the Faure cell not been available, be-
cause in the circumstances the surgical
electrician, with his paraphernalia of
voltaic battery to be set up beforehand,
would not have been practically admis-
sible.
The largest useful application waiting
just now for the Faure battery-and it
is to be hoped that the very minimum
of time will be allowed to pass till the
battery is supplied for this application
is to do for the electric light what a
water cistern in house does for an in
constant water supply. A little battery
Of seven of the boxes described by your
correspondent suflices to give the in
candescence in Swan or Edison lights
to the extent of 100 candles for six
hours, without any perceptible diminu-
ton of brilliancy. Thus, instead of
needing a gas engine or steam engine to
be kept at work as long as the light is
wanted, with the liability of the light
failing at any moment through the slim
ping of a belt-an accident of too fire.
quent occurrence-or any other break
down ar ctOnpa oo of tho ~, n .ksssa...- : /,