Hopkinsville Kentuckian. [volume] (Hopkinsville, Ky.) 1889-1918, 1895-08-06
FREEZING QUICKSAND.
Novel Engineering Experiment In
Progress In New York.
A Difficult Problem Which Gotham's New
Driveway Has Presented to the Con-
tractors-How 1t Is Being Solved
Watched with Interest.

Same Of the work on the Speed.
way, as contractors who are doing
1t have already found out, is going
to cost much more than the pre-
liminary estimates of the park de-
partment engineers, says the New
York Herald. The city will, OF
course, will have to pay for 1t finally,
but meanwhile as the costs roll up
engineers are very greatly interest
ed in process to which the added
expense will be due. 1t is no more
or less than freezing quicksand.
The, work is going on at o point IN
hAhconstruction of the Speedway
immediately south of High Bridge,
where there is now huge hole in
the ground along the Harlem river,
which will be even longer and deep
er before the work of securing a
foundation for the Speedway retain
ing wall is completed.
The work is Of character to Pc
culiarly interest engineers. Though
somewhat similar steps have been
adopted once or twice in the history
of engineering science before, never
have the same intricate problems
been presented as now. The success
of this experiment will be watched,
therefore, with interest. It's cost
will probably be in the neighborhood
of thirty-fve thousand dollars.
James D. Leary has the contract
for constructing the section of Speed
way upon which this unusual effort
is to be made, and, curiously enough,
the difficulty was encoun tered in the
final fifty feet of his contract, which
extends only from One Hundred and
Fifty-hfth street to High Bridge.
The work necessitates sinking re-
tanning wall to a rock foundation
along the river side of the Speedway,
and engineers soundings at this
particular point located this rock
eighteen feet below the surface.
Whether their sounding rods struck
q detached stone here or not Is not
certain, but 1t has developed that
hard bottom is probably twenty
feet lower than supposed at the
outset.
After sinking their sheeting to
what was presumed to be the re-
9yfHed depth it was found to be too
short, and then q bed of quicksand
developed, and no Roadway could be
made. In this emergency the ex-
pedient Of freezing this bank Of
quicksand and water so that it
would not overflow the excavation
for the wallis foundation had to be
adopted.
St wart & McDermott are doing
this work, and they have introduced
several new ideas into it. The plan
is to freeze the bank whence the flow
of mud and sand comes, so that a
solid wall will be formed, next which
the excavation will be sunk to the
required depth probably thirty-five
feet or more. To accomplish this
row Of four-inch pipes about three
feet apart, capped at the bottom,
have been sunk perpendicularly to
depth of forty feet. Into each a
smaller pipe, open at the bottom,
has been inserted to within an inch
and half of the bottom. BY means
of huge condenser cold air is
forced through the small pipes into
the larger and returned for further
service into the condenser. 1t has
been possible thus to use air cooled
by expansion to about fifty degrees
below zero, and the effect of this
intense cold upon the flowing mud
and quicksand has been to solidify
1t. With Golfer dam to exclude
the water of the Harlem the excava-
ton is now being slowly sunk to
rock. Some time will be required to
complete this intricate work, but it
is expected to prove a success in the
end.