Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1895-02-20
TREMENDOUS PRESSURE.
A Machine the Hydraulic Principle
but Usiu.; Oil Instead of Water.

A Machine the Hydraulic Principle,
but Usiu.; Oil Instead of Water.
NThe reporter went the other day to
see wonderful machine, machine
which is not only q prodigious and ter
rible piece CT ensinery, but an allegory.
1t is called 4 testing machine, and it is
used to ascertain the resisting power of
various materials. 1t is not content
with finding out that IL beam Of oak, for
instance, will bear without breaking q
pressure Oh one spot of 100, 900 pounds.
The beam must be utterly crushed each
time the test is made, and note must he
taken of the exact weight that lay upon
it at the moment of its final dissolution.
Day after day this great machine heaves
slow and awful force upon some tough
beam or block of wood, and whether the
timber is placed hatwise and needs, say,
but paltry rs tons to crush it, or
whether it be placed endwise, like a
pillar, and will hold up twice as much
weight before it cries out and gives up
the ghost, it must yield just the same
and surrender its pitiful, crushed frame
to be photographed and studied and
picked to pieces for tho benefit of sci
ence. That is all very interesting, you
may say, but it is a mere piece of brute
machinery. Where is the allegory that
you told us of? That lies in the thing
by the force of which this monstrous
pressure is exerted. 1t is oil. Nothing
but suave, gentle, yielding oil. the en-
bleln of softness and agreeableness
There is certain piston in this
mechanism which, pressing against q
quantity of oil in a confined space, forces
this oil against another iron surface,
which in turn presses forward upon the
timber so that all this crushing power is
exerted by the medium of nothing but
oil As you watch the machine. even in
the most exciting moment of the culni-
nation of its crushing force, you can
not but be conscious that it is the oil
that is doing it. Tho master stands over
his great machine, his pupils grouped
about. 1t lies down fat on its great.
back, like giant bracing his shoulder
against rock to push with his feet.
The thing which he is pushing against
is beam of seasoned cak, about 10
inches square, and the thing with which
he is pushing is another and lengthwise
square beam of oak, the end Of which is
directly against the side OF the beam to
be crushed. Off at one side, apparently
unconnected with the machine, but in
reality connected with it, is an appara-
tus where there are levers, comparable
with the throttle valve of a locomotive,
and gauge which registers accurately
the pressure that is being exerted. A
young learner stands at these levers and
this gauge, and when the master says,
''Turn on moro oil, ho moves lever,
and the pressure rises. Seventy thou
sand pounds, $4,000 pounds, it rises
rapidly. The lengtllwiso beam is sink
ing itself deep into the side Of the vic
tim timber, but this still holds out
bravely. Tho pressure rises to 80, 1000
100, 900 pounds The watchers all gather
around the center of the pressure i'll an
ticipation OF the catastrophe; the leSgth
Wise timber is squeezing into the solid
Oth VI luO OtICI OiN - Oiio tiiitliiD
might be driven into piece Of cheese.
But still it holds. Little by little the
power is turned on. The youlg man at
the gauge calls 1920, 900, "150. 900. "
$40, OO0," "150, 000.' You hear the
swapping Of myriad of tendons within
the beam, and all these sounds join i'll a
sort of low buzzing roar or cry, which
suggests az elemental agony. One hun
dred and sixty thousand pounds-the
beam sinks deeper into the flesh of its
victim; 17G 600. moro DILL calls the
master, and now the crackle rises-the
lengthwise beam itself begins to crack,
and the other beam, yielding at last,
seems to go to pieces all at once, and
when the pressure is removed it is taken
out, twisted, contorted, riven, pierced,
crushed.
1t is useful service, after all, though
it seems but an exhibition of the brutal
ity of mere mechanism, that the testing
machine and its bed of oil have done,
for since the master began the work
with it he has proved that timbers will
stand only about half the weight which
the accepted authorities said they would
stand, and by introducing q more con-
servative weighting of wood he has
doubtless saved many human lives from
destruction by the collapse Of timbered
structures. Boston Transcript.