The Helena independent. [volume] (Helena, Mont.) 1875-1943, 1891-07-26
MAY FLY TO ENGLAND.
A Quaker City Genius Claims to Have
Solved a Difficult
Problem.
Wind and Hot Air Motors Which
Are to Make Ocean
Voyages.
Tho Trial Trip of n Small Balloon to show
How Easy 1t Is-The Inventor u
German.

Quaker City genius ia not generally cred-
tied with efforts in the direction of rapid
transit, but Inventor Charles Z. Fest has
just completed a most curious machine at
his home in Germantown, Il suburb Of
Philadelphia. 1t is q CROSS between a bal
loon and an airship, says the New York
realize fame and fortune. To-day or to-
morrow Mr.. Frest expects to start on a
vpyage Of thirty-s six hours in what he says
is his experimental airship, and upon the
SUCCESS of this first venture will depend the
rise or fall of his hopes.
For over fourteen years Inventor Fest
has been experimenting with all kinds of
airships, and in that time he has expended
several thousands of dollars. He says,
and friends who have watched his
progress bear him out in the
statement, that he has Mt last
succeeded in rigging a machine that will 90
to the clouds and remain there long enough
to be waited thousands of miles by an ordi-
nary wind. The chief characteristic OF Mr..
TESTS invention is what he terms the hot
air principle, and he believes he has at last
solved the great problem Of aerial naviga-
ton. He objects to the gas balloon on ac-
count of the limited time it can be kept in
suspension, this being due to the loss of gas.
This difficulty. it is claimed, does not occur
when the hot-air method is made use of.
While the troubles caused by the loss Of
gas can be overcome by the new scheme,
there are others which the Germantown
man claims to have done way with. After
much hard work he has constructed an air
heater which seems to the ordinary man Of
intelligence to be a very practical idea.
This thing is the outgrowth of MIR. TESTS
own brain, nothing like 1t ever having been
used before. The heater is light, strong and
fiteproof, and with three gallons of Raso-
line it is expected to keep the aerial naviga-
tor in midair about forty-eiRht hours. This
much, at least. he expects his ship to do
and he thinks that in the course of another
year it can be brought to such a state of
perfection that one of the balloons can be
kept i'll the clouds four or five days.
The trial trip is to be made with a spher-
ical balloon 221 feet in diameter, with a
cubical volume of 8,945 feet. These dimen-
sions, with a difference of temperature be-
tween 1870 degrees inside and 70 degrees
outside, will enable the balloon to lift 100
pounds. To this air bag is attached the
heater, which very much resembles an
elongated stove pipe and extends upward
through the balloon almost to the equator
and projecting several feet below the bas-
ket.
The whole thing is very simple with the
exception of the interior of the pipe. All
the peculiar mechanism of the fireplace is
contained in the queer looking pipe and
his is the part which the inventor refuses
to ALLOW the public to examine. To feed
the pipe gasoline is carried from q convent
ent tank through very small pipes. It burns
quietly and without danger of fire or ex-
plosion. This was the most difficult obsta-
Gle Mr.. Fest had to overcome.
ShnTl1 thlS nvnariJnnpf yrnvn cntiofoN-
tory Fest will certainly build a monster
ship to sail across the waters to Europe.
This, he says, is what he is living for, and
when that is accomplished he will be salts
fed. What he wants to do is to effect rapid
transit between American and Europe.
He claims to have reason to be-
lieve that there Is a constant air
current blowing eastward that will
send his balloon rapidly across the Atlantic
ocean. He figures that this current of mir
will send his balloon to the old world in
less than two days, or at n speed of more
than a mile minute. Tho existence of these
carrents has been shown many times by the
experience of aerial ~nayigators. He
reckons that this breeze will carry as large
a ship as he can build across the Atlantic
in three days at the outside, and thus work
q grand revolution in the travel between
the two continents. The only difficulty in
such n scheme as this is i'll getting Il ma
chine to remain for that length of time in
the air. This obstacle he claims to have
overcome by the use of hot air. and conse-
quently there will be no gas to escape and
send the travellers to a watery grave.
Mr.. Fest first saw the light of day fifty
years ago in Wurtemburg, Germany, and he
emigrated to this country in 1860. TIL fol-
lowing year he enlisted in the union army.
After his honorable discharge i'll 1863 he
began business i'll the city of New York as
an engraver of pearl and ivory. In 1879 he
removed to Philadelphia, where he is now
conducting the same business on Il very
successful scale on Lena street, German
town.
Tho ship which is to be sent up on the ex-
perimental trip will not carry any passen-
gers. but by the aid of the postal cards,
dropped automatically every hour, and IL
floating flag buoy its exact movements may
be traced, thus determining the question as
to whether il will cross the Atlantic, and
also as to how long it will stay in the air.