The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1899-04-02
bctte$t Of Beats
Science BaS Got yUitbin 1900
Degrees Of Solar Tteandesteuee.

Degrees 81 solar IftealtdeSeellee.
New York. April 1.-The Journal says:
sAll known heat records were broken the
other day at Columbia University by Pro
lessor Tucker, in an experiment. He sue
ceeded in producing heat of such terrific
Intensity that steel hard quartz and even
platinum vanished in vapor before it.
Ordinary crucibles could not be used.
When this blighting heat was applied TO
them they and their contents vanished in
a little puff of smoke.
The heat obtained was $500 degrees
Fahrenheit-2OO degrees hotter than any
thing that had been produced before.
No mere fire furnished such a heat as
this. 1t took a specially constructed cleo
7rical furnace and a current of unusual
power to accomplish this feat An arc
formed between opposing carbons gave the
extreme Of heat.
Scientifically the experiment was Of i'm
portance, because it has demonstrated that
the degree of heat obtained some time ago
by Professor Moisson of Paris, was not
the greatest possible. Commercially it is
useful, because ii has shown that dia-
monds of marketable size and purity may
be made artificially. Further. it has given
TO commerce two products of almost meal
culable vaUe-calcium carbide and silicium
carbide.
The first OF these has been manufactured
before and used for making acetylene
gas. Hitherto its high price has hindered
its wilder use. Professor Tucker has now
demonstrated that under great heat it can
IN f},r nd ,,1o full
Silicium carbide is a new product. and
might almost be called an artificial pur-
pie diamond in hardness it ranks be-
tween Ihe diamond and the sapphire It's
discoverer believes that it is destined TO
take the place of the diamond for all
grinding and cutting operations while he
says it viii certainly sIpersede corun-
DUN, which is now used for the heavy
filing done in foundres.
1t is difficult TO appreciate the trenen-
dous heat which has produced these things
unless some comparison is insti4ted.
Scaldins water means a temperature Of
212 degrees Fahrenheit The red-hot horse
shoe, which the blacksmith works upon,
averages a heat of 500 degrees. Steel,
which is unusually refractory to heat,
nevertheless succumhs to about 1900 de-
grees. At a temperature Of $500 degrees
it bois like 80 much water.
The heat which Professor Tucker OBJ
tanned at Columbia University was enarly
twice as great as that which forces steel
TO bubble like saucepan of milk on a
hot stove.
The estimated heat Of the interior Of the
sun is ony 10000 degrees and astronomers
and others tell Us that it is hot that
the interior is practically an incandescent
gas. The heat Professor Tucker obtained
Is only 300 degrees short of that.
There is practically no limit to the heat
which. under suitable conditions. may be
developed from an electric furnace, but
there is a decided limit to the scientists
ability to measure that heat.
Ordinary thermometers are useless.
Mercury boils at a heat of 800 degrees and
becomes vapor at d temperature not very
much higher. To attempt TO measure a
temperature such as that obtained by
Professor Tucker with an instrument of
glass and quicksilver would be as sensible
as to try to plumb the crater OF a volcano
with a bamboo fish pole.
Chemists have been bothered by this
condition at each end of the scale, for it
IS almost as hard to measure evtreme
cold as extreme heat. Mercury freezes
solid at only 90 degrees below zero, and
even alcohol turns into ice at 2o2 below.
Professor Dewar not long ago produced
what he calls absolute zero''-or point
4e1 degrees below zero-and he had to do
Just what Professor Tucker did invent
an apparatus which could gauge unusual
temperature.
The arrangement used for this purpose
IS called calorimeter and it is rather
Intricate piece Of apparatus. While it de-
ponds upon mercury for the recording Of
the degree of heat or cold obtained, the
reading is not made in the direct way that
obtains with the ordinary thermometer.
The readings of the cal0rimeter are taken,
and some calculation is necessary to de-
termine the exact value i'm degrees Of heat
or cold of the figures. ecause Of this fact
It is usually found that the actual heat