The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1897-01-10
An ELECTRIC WONDER.
EDIsoN's CARBONIZED FILAMENT
AND ITS WORK.

1oSSiDIltty - some Ftl0ments Are
Worth $44S,0OO a Pound-story of
the Invention.
From the New York Sun.
HOW many persons realize, as they sit
under the brilliant glow of the incandes-
cent electric light what a wonderful thing
Is the bit of carbon filament that gives
life to this most modern substitute for the
tallow dip of the forefathers? Only two
generations ago mankind was content and
even thankful when night came on to put
IRE to the wick of a tallow candle, and
then armed with a pair of scissors-like
snuifers, to trim the crustly wick from
time to time, and, leaning far over toward
the public light, carry on study or read
ing for pleasure with full belief that
nothing better could be devised to dispel
the shadow. Later came the solar lamp
which, fed with sperm oil, proved vastly
better and generation ago, with the dis
covery Of cheap gas making and of kerr
osene oil, it seemed as if both city and
country people were provided with illum-
inants which had made night as nearly
like day as was possible for the finite pow
ers of man.
Then IN the late seventies came that
most wonderful practical demonstration
by the wizard of Menlo park that there
was new use for electricity, ushering in
light which pu. ali others into the shade
and proved to the whole world that the
possibilities of enthralled lightning were
beyond all the previous dreams of man
kind. To-day, In homes or Office, in no.
tells, theaters, railroad stations, street cars
ana ferryboats one finds this subtle genius
no
America or Europe it is only necessary to
turn button to flood the rooms with
light. For this, which is perhaps the
greatest blessing given by inventions Of
modern days, one man is to be thanked,
and he is Thomas A. Edison. He is the
inventor of the carbon flament which has
made the ineandescent electric lamp a
commercial success, and the industries to
which his genius gave life have perfected
and cheapened it until there are few towns
so small that they cannot have the benefit
of this best of lights. BY the later de-
velopments of storage batteries even is
olated country houses are provided with
plants which enable them to vie with the
houses of the city in brilliant illumna-
ton. Tesla and few others of the great
men of electrical science hold out prom
ises that some day people may be able
to do away with the present form of cleo
trio lighting and substitute for it tubes
which will glow brilliantly, but this is al.
in the future. There is nothing at pres
ent to compete with the invention of Edi-
son.
What this electric lamp is all can see.
There is first a bulb of clear glass set in
a socket which contains also a button
which turns the vivlfying current. With
n this bulb quivers the soul of the lamp.
With the lamp lighted this appears to be
merely a curved streak of fire 1t may be
possible for the eye to distinguish that it
has in some cases the form of an elonga-
ted horseshoe, and in others that this is
complicated by the addition of longer OF
shorter oval section between the outer
lines of the u, but no eye is sharp enough
to pierce the briiiancy OF it's light and see
the actual thing from which this radiance
proceeds.
Look at the lamp again by daylight
with the electric current turned off, and
there, within the bulb OF glass, you will
see a tiny thread of something black, so
delicate that it rivals the aspen leaf in it's
restlessness. This is the Edison carbon
hlament, which is not only the great light
giver of the new era, but is at the same
time one of the most expensive of the
products of human ingenuity. few of
the products of natures laboratory, cost
ly because of their rarity, such as gems
of diamond, ruby, sapphire, and pearl,
surpass this common charcoal in value,
but gold is as dross compared with it,, and
the man who would purchase carbon fila
ments with silver would have to repeat
the later experiences of the folks of the
southern confederaey who took their
money to market in a basket and brought
home their purchases in a purse. Some
body writing in trade newspaper recent
ly directed attention to the enormous
value which these flaments have when
estimated by the pound avoirdupois, and
a Sun reporter went to the lamp works Of
the General Electric Company at Harri-
son, N. j., to look into this interesting
subject. Supt. Eyre became interested in
this view of the subject at once, although
it was not a new one to him, and, sum-
moning some of his department assistants,
he made, with help, some very interest
ing calculations
The standard lamp for general use is of
sixteen-candle power. Out of the 10000 900
electric lamps used every year in the
world this size is believed to number 80
per cent. A carbon filament for that
sized lamp measures 41,0O0 of an inch in
diameter and ten inches in length, and 200
of these put upon a scale weighed ten
grains. MIR. Eyre's calculations soon
demonstrated that, with 1900 grains to
the pound avoirdupois, 1t would take 140-
900 of these flaments to make a pound.
and that at the current market rate for
these, $40 a thousand, their market value
would be $1,400 A man can carry $50
pounds in a sack on his back, and If the
sack were filled with such bits of carbon
mis- load would be worth $4,000.
Take but a single pound of these fila
ments and stretch them out in a contin-
uous straight line, and they would cover
a space 1888 feet. or about 21.3 miles
The worlds product for a year would
reach 3157 miles, and in a little more
than seven years, at the present rate
would reach completely around the globe.
But the value Of the filament of this
size is small compared with that of some
for the smallest of the lamps made.
Whether a flament be for large or small
lamps it costs about the same sum to
market it. but its candle power makes a
great difference in its size and weight. The
smallest OF the incandescent lamps used
for regular purposes is OF three-c candle
power. For this the filament is Of a plain
U shape, and is $1,000 inch in diameter
and three-eighths-lnch long. Mr.. Eyres
calculations showed that there would be
100000 of these TO a pound, and these
would be worth $4,000. But, again, the
lamp makers manufacture many tiny
lamps for surgical and dental uses. The
smallest of these is called the pea lamp.
Its tiny bulb is about one-fourth OF an