Clinch Valley news. [volume] (Jeffersonville, Va.) 18??-2019, 1889-09-20
SODA WATER.
Ali ABoUT - REFRESHING SUM.
NIIsR DRINK.
-ialsing the Marble Fountain-Its
Interior Construction u Marvel
OF Ingenuity How Soda
Water is Made.

: -lnto slaDS, and the manner in which
this operation is performed would excite
your establishment, says Boston letter to
the New Orleans Pic0yuac The block is
| placed on solid wooden "skids," willie n
swinging frame of parallel saws, 10 feet
each in length, descends upon the marble
mass from above. The frame holdinp tho
saws traverses back aud forth, under the
action of powerful machinery, dividiir.
the great stone by slow degrees into
slices, the thickness of which is regulated
by the space between the saws. Thus n
rough 10-foot cube is soon transformed
into, say, forty smooth slabs of 3-inches
thickness. But the cutting, strange to
say, is not really done by the saws, but
by sand, which, mixed with water. con
tinually flows from overhead upon the
marble block. The saws, which are of
steel and toothless, grind the sand into
the stone along the lines of cleavage, and
in this manner the slicing is accom-
plishcd, two weeks being required to
transform into slabs such block rs
that described. The slab thus pro-
duced is roughcd out ACCORDING
to design by the "coper, 3
after which the cutter prepares it
for polishing by smoothing or the edges,
etc. Next, after being chafed down by
steel wheels with wet sand, it is polished
laboriously by hand with whetstones.
The final shine is put on with felt. each
KIND OF marble requiring some particular
kind of assistant in the performance of
this last process, such as jewelers. rouge,
polishcrs' putty, or oXalic acid. Circular
holes are cut i'll the slab, if desired, with
revolving steel saws, though little ones are
made with a small tubular drill, The pierre
ing end of which is set around with n
circle OF good sized diamonds. These stones
arc not of the precious variety, however,
being. black and not useful for orna-
mental purposes. But they cut Just the
same. Bcvcled and rounded edges are
put on by revolving steel instruments
that do the work automatically, and thus
the piece of marble is turned out i'm
finished shape 10 be boltctl and ccmcnted
with others into the soda-water fountain
OF which it is intended to form Il part.
The marble dust produced incidentally
to the processes described, by the way, is
mostly sold as an ingredient FOR asphaitum
pavement mixture and TO adultcratc
putty.
The making of the fountains inside
works is not less laborious than the pre-
paration and construction of the marble
exterior. In the fountain, rs represented
by its ultimate development to-day, the
most important feature is the cooling an
paratus which occupies the place Of !.
sort OF stomach for the concern. This
stomach is in the shape of big tank,
taking up nearly all of the room inside
above the line of spigots, and kept filled
with ice. In the bottom of the tank is
an intestinal arrangement of coilcd metal
tubes, cylinders and things resembling
backing boxes. Taken together they
represent the utmost accomplishment of
mechanical science thus far in the line
of refrigeration. They require very lit
tie space, and yet the work they do is
surprising. Tie tubes, the cylinders and
the blacking-boX cells, us they are called,
are ali connected together i'll such a way
that the stream Of soda water coming from
the storage receptacle beneath flows
hundreds of feet through an ice
surrounded channel before passing out
mt the draft-tubc into the tumblcr,
where it consequently arrives mt about
freezing point. The storage re-
ccptaclc referred to is introduced under
the fountain and attached for purposes of
supply until IFS contents are exhausted
and another one takes its place. The
tubes are made of solid block tin, and the
cylinders and cells are lined with the same
material also, as we'll as the spigots. This
metal is uniformly employed to cover
every surface with which the soda water
comes into contact, for the reason that it
communicates no poison to the drink.
Pure tin is used even for soldering the
cylinders and blacking-box cells, which
are tested to stand Il strain of $50 pounds
to tie square inch, or about twice what
an engine boiler is expected to endure.
For the storage receptaclcs are charged
with gas mt an enormous pressure so as to
get ms much carbonic-lioxide into the
water rs possible. And, beside all this,
the man who draws the stuff must know
just how to do it, or it will be fiat and
unsatisfactory. 1t is partly on this ac-
count that the soda water at one shop is
so much better than ut another. If the
fountain is not n good one, or the mer-
chant sparing of his ice, the reason for
the poor quality of the product is not far
to seek. The soda water itself is always
tirst-rate, as it comes originally from the
manufacturers, who supply all retailers
save only Il few who Go business in spots
not readily or cheapiy accessible by rail or
otherwise.
The manufacture of soda water in such
vast quantities is quite an interesting
business. Perhaps, in the first place, it
would be as well to explain that the bcv-
erage is simply ordinary water charged
with carbonic acid gas, the former tax
ing up under pressure somewhat more
than its own volume of the latter. The
gas is obtained from marble dust, which
is ground up and shipped for this purpose
by the thousands of barrels ut Sing Sing,
n. Y, and other points where white
marble of n cheap, crumbly sort, not use
full for building, is found. Now, when
the earth we live upon was in fiery and
molten state, the rocks which composed
it fused and liquiiied by plutonic heat,
strange chemical transformations were
nrOliIcpH NV notttrc 1r;f1,