Little Falls weekly transcript. (Little Falls, Morrison Co., Minn.) 1894-19??, 1896-05-29
DIRECT FROM co A,.

DIRECT FROM COAL.
EXPERIMENTS ON IA NEW METHOD
OF OBTAINING POWER.
From Coal-Profsssor Eessenden frying
to Improve tho Great invention The
Eve Of : Revolution. .ss
Students Of the Western uniyersity. nm
der the direction of Professor Reginald A.
Fessenden, professor Of electrical engineer
ing, are building cell on the principle Of
that invented by DR.. William w. JACQUES
Of Boston, with view to testing the ell
ciency Of the method Of making electricity
direct from coal. Professor Fessenden and
his electrical students, however, propose
to experiment. to improve the invention so
rs to make it Of commercial value. Sew
eral difficulties stand In the way Of perfect
operation, and these Professor Fessenden
hopes to eliminate. He will also see Just
how much electricity can be obtained from
pound Of coal and find just what com
parison us to economy and efficiency there
Is between the new and revolutionary
method and the old steam engine.
Professor Fessenden believes the inyen-
ton of DR.. Jacques is far ahead Of any
previous Inventions in that direction and
thinks Its perfection means an entire rev.
olution in industry to the advantage of
Pittsburg. He said:
1 1.-The discovery of DR.. Jacques ID the
most important that has been made in
that line, and If certain minor difficulties
can be overcome it will result In the steam
engine being entirely superseded. From
the experiments of DR.. Cross, professor of
electrical engineering at the Boston In
i stitute of Technology, it seems that about
50 per cent of energy In the coal can be got
out when working on n small scale, and
probably more on larger scale. This
means that while with the most efficient
steam engine at present known 80 per cent
of the energy In the coal is wasted, this
method wastes only about IS per cent and
I is consequently about eight times as eco
monica: as the best triple expansion steam
engine.
Moreover, the capital cost Of thea ppa-
ratus for producing power will be enor-
mously reduced. In first class central
station for supplying power the cost of
boilers, engines condensers, dynamos
smokestacks and other necessary parts of
the machinery comes to about 500 per
| horsepower, while, oven after making
every allowance for the working Of the car
bon battery, it does not seem probable
| that the initial cost would amount to more
than one-ffth as much. In view Of the
| fact that the interest on the capital az
count on central station amounts to
about 40 to 60 per cent Of the total run
ming expenses, the Importance Of this fea-
! ture will be appreciated.
1.-the question resolves itself down, first,
to this: Can good, pure carbon be- pro-
duced from Pittsburg coal cheaply enougha
In Wow of the fact that tho battery will
only consume one-tenth Of the coal a steam
engine does, then, if we can make one
pound of carbon for less price than we
can buy ten pounds of coal, there Is saw
ing. It is reasonable to suppose this can
be done. This operation Of TRANSFORMING
| coal into carbon is necessitated by the fact
that coal itself Is a nonconduotor and must
ffrst be cooked. Coal Is d by drocarbon, ard
By thus coking 1t the hydrogen compounds
are driven off or deoomposed and the car
| bon alone left behind. This is done in an
ordinary coking oven, provided precau-
| lions are taken to secure the coke In large
masses. s J *
tThere is another question whether
the chemical bath Of caustio soda can be
| kept pure, or can be renewed at small
cost. Two difficulties may arise. First,
the impurities in the coke may contain
mate the bath rapidly, and, second, the
caustio soda may combine with the car
bonic acid gas given off and form carbon
ate of Soda This last difficulty can, +
think, be avoided by mixing small por-
| - fto oil hiS ic .rNf
the experiments the students and I are
going to try. s-.y. .ss ~ z
IF this plan proves practicable, and
there is no reason to doubt that the diff
oulties encountered will be overcome In
the near future, the company operating an
electric plant will make slack into coke In
retort ovens. The product will then be re-
moved, possibly without further trent
ment, If 1t Is found possible to obtain large
masses of coke, and will be put directly
into the electrolytio cells. These would
probably be Of large size, possibly 6 feet
long and 2 feet square, and would be In
closed In brickwork to prevent radiation.
"They would likely be heated by the gas
| from tho retort ovens. About 600 of these
cells, each capable of producing 60 horse
power, would be used by an electric trao-
tion company, and the total amount Of
coal used would be one-twentieth Of that
at present, for the reason that the losses at
small loads would not be so great as they
are on street railway plants run by steam
! engines You always lose about 20 to 30
per cent Of power In street railway work
BY friction and other constant losses
Pittsburg Dispatch.
Only One Girl In That Glass For Anybody.
Mrs. Luella Wilcox st. Clair, president
Of Christian college, Columbia, Mo-, re-
Gently requested all the members Of the
GLASS which will graduate this year to state
briefly in writing their principal purpose
In life. A number Of interesting answers
resulted. Ten Of the girls replied that u