Morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven [Conn.]) 1848-1894, 1886-11-06

An Address by Mr.. M. H. Edison, the
Electrician and Inventor-An Inter-
estlng Meeting-BOIIer Explosions
And Popular Fallacy.

An Address by Mr.. WI. H. Edison, thu
Electrician and Inventor-An Inter-
estIng MeetIng-BoIIer Explosions
And a Popular Fallacy.
A highly interesting meeting of the Sta
tionary Engineers association was held last
evening at the hall of the association, No 81
Church street. The large audience present
listened with great interest and pleasure to
| the speaker of the occasion, Mr.. M. R. Edison,
| M. E., the electrician and inventor, who
| spoke for about an hour upon the merits of
| the Edison recording pressure gauge. After
preliminary remarks Mr.. Edison said: shall
therefore confine myself to the consideration
| of steam and the steam boiler under the two
| general heads, that of safety and that of
economy. year or SO ago DR.. Robert H.
Thurston, who, as you are aware, stands
among our leading authorities on such sub
jects, read paper before the American So
ciety of Mechanical Engineers upon "Steam
Boilers as Magazines of Explosive Energy"
and to some of the suggestions therein CON
tanned l will refer. The paper related to a
series of calculations as to the magnitude of
the energy stored and contained in mass of
steam and water when heated to steam |
producing temperature. In the paper
it is stated that very little of the destructive
effect of an explosion is due to the steam
which is confined to the steam chamber at |
the moment of the explosion, the rupture of !
the boiler being due to the explosive power |
made at the moment from the steam and the |
water both at temperature higher than the |
boiling point. 1t states that explosions are
due to the enormous quantity of steam pro- /
duced from the water itself by successive op-
erations of heat, and successive escapes of |
the pent up steam; or to state |
it in detail: Gas soon as the |
nd nv
the compressive force upon the water a new /
issue of steam takes place from the water, |
reducing the temperature; when this escapes |
and further lessons the compressive force of |
the steam another issue of steam of lower /
temperature from the water takes place,
again reducing the temperature; and so on
till at length the temperature of the water is
reduced to the atmospheric boiling point"
etc. The action of the steam which may hap
pen to be present in the boiler at the
instant of rupture is considered unimportant.
In some experiments by Mr. George Biddle, !
the conclusion reached by the locomotive
boiler at four atmospheric pressures in SO
discharging Its contents by the process of
continuous evaporation was that the work SO
done was to be compared with that of ex-
ploding gunpowder and the conclusion that
he finally reached was as follows:
''That the destructive energy of one cubic |
foot of water at temperature which pro-
duces sixty pounds pressure to the square !
inch is equal to that of one pound of gun
powder"
The speaker after wildly impressing the
fact contained in the above sentence told |
how well the law came in to protect human
life against gunpowder, and then called at
tention to the fact that upon the invention
of his recording gauge a law was passed by
Congress that all vessels moved by steam
must have this instrument or one performing
like service; but the law has, after years of
effort, failed to have effect, and to- day, out
of 5000 or 7, 900 United States vessels moved
by steam, less than one dozen are 80 pro
tected. After other obser atoms the speak
er said that "having returned in 1868 from
three years cruise as member
of the United States Naval Engineer
corps joined Mr.. B. Edison,
my father, and engineer of great expert
ence of the name of George P. Clarke, who
was engaged in the solution of the problem
as to how to construct reliable instrument
that should correctly record upon paper the
pressure of steam. -Four years elapsed be-
fore the instrument was discovered. Then |
fourteen years ago the instrument the uses
of which form the subject of discussion this
evening was devised. Since that time it has
remained unchanged and has met with ap- |
preciative uses in all parts of the globe"