News and citizen. [volume] (Morrisville, Vt. ;) 1881-current, 1881-12-29
Carrying Pure Air in a Knapsack.

Successful experiments have been
carried on by Mr.. Warrington Smythe,
st the New Seaham Colliery, near New
castle, England, with what is termed
the Fleuss breathing apparatus. The
importance of this invention will at
once be apparent to those who are in
any way acquainted with the risks from
sIlffocation run by tiremen and those
employed under ground, where poison
GUS fumes are SO liable to break forth
and suffocate those who may be subject
to them. With the aid of the Fleuss
machine men can work without danger
under all these inimical conditions.
The apparatus has the size and shape
of soldiers knapsack, its principal por-
ton being a case of sheet copper, twelve
inches long, twelve inches wide, and two
and half inches deep. The case is in
ternally divided into four longitudinal
compartments, fitted up so as to secure
the complete circulation through them
of the air that has been robbed of its
oxygen by passage through the lungs.
Each compartment is fitted with small
cubes of India rubber sponge, coated
with specially prepared caustic soda. The
air that passes from the lungs of the
through one side of n modthpiece and
down the corresponding short length of
pipe over his left shoulder to the first
compartment of the case. There it goes
through O finely-balanced valve, which
gives way to the softest breath passing
from the mouth, but is immovable to
anything from the inside of the case.
The partition of the first compartment
ainCllxy mn 10 ha S,f he I,,R
Is about one inch open at the bottom.
This arrangement thus permits the re-
splred air to pass down the first
chamber and to enter the second
at the bottom. Here it circu-
lates to the top. where an inch
opening In the next partition gives it
passage into the third compartment,
which it descends, to find similar out
let at the bottom into the fourth cham
Der. Rising to the head of this COM
partment, the air thus purified from the
deleterious matter that it has carried
from the lungs passes through valve
into pipe laid over the right shoulder
OF the operator. Oxygen is added bv
means of small pipe that runs from
the cylinder at the bottom of the case.
and finds its opening close to the iunc.
ton OF the clean air-pipe and the before
mentioned India-rubber bag. This lat
ter performs the part of reservoir of
pure and properly oxygenated air. and
by its presence the act of breathing is
rendered easy and natural. In fact. tina
only limit to the space of time during
which the apparatus enables the man ia
move about in the midst of poisonous
gases is the capacity of the oxygen cylin-
der and the individuals physical ability
to carry the copper knapsack about with
him. The capacity of the cylinders at
present in use is one fourth of cubic
foot, and as the oxygen is pumped in
under pressure of sixteen atmospheres,
they hold four cubic feet of gas. The
supply, which can be regulated through
the medium of a valve, is calculated to
last for four hours shift of work. al
though no man employed under such
conditions of danger as require its use is
kept at labor more than three hours.
An essential portion of the apparatus
is tine mask, to which is attached q
mouthpiece screwed ON one side to the
pure-air pipe and India-rubber bag. and
on the other to the pipe conveying the
expired air back to the compartment in
the knapsack case-Rubber Era.