Amador ledger., 1909-06-25

MISCELLANY
Reported weekly for the Ledger.

Accidentally Hardened Copper. "A
Great Mud Flow. -- Certainty Of
Anti Typhoid. -lllectrolytio Iron.
Bottled Acetylene. A Hot-Box
Signal. An Improved lrixer of
Nitrogen. "A Meteor's Burning. A
Novel Primary Battery.
The hardening aud strengthening
influence of minute proportion OF
some element in an alloy, which is a
marvel and mystery of metallurgy, is
not confined to the various steels,
Arsenic Is hardly appIeGiable i'm
purity of furnace copper. but it now
appears that the electrolytic copper
coming so generally into use is too
pure for certain purposes. On the
Prussian railways it has been noticed
in recent years that the number of
fractured locomotive stay bolts was
strangely increasing. Investigation
shows that this has followed the in
creasing use of electrolytio copper.
and that of % broken staybolt col
lected, 81 were of this metal. and
only 2 of furnace copper. or the
electrolytic samples, only one con-
tanned arsenic, which was present in
all furnace copper bolts tested. The
high quality of copper containing
traces of arsenic had been already re-
ooguized. and railways in Italy and
the British colonies specify 0.l5 to
0. So per cent of arsenic as necessary
in all copper bought.
The outburst of mud of Jan. 18th
from near Mount Banaiao, in the
Philippine province of Tayabas, is
reported by 9. q. Wreutmore Of
Manila to have flowed ten miles to
the sea, spreading 5000, 600 tons of
material IN layer foot deep over
an average width of halt mile.
Great numbers Of rocks three to four
feet IN diameter we're deposited, with
some much larger. A landslide had
choked up gorge on tire slope of the
mountain. and heavy rains had gradu-
ally formed a pond behind the dam
of rocks and loose earth, until finally
the obstruction gave way.
OF 5, Alb British soldiers inoculated
with anti-tpyhoid vaccine, Col. w. b.
Leishman reports that only u after
ward had the disease, with 2 deaths,
while of 6,G10 on-inoculated in the
same regiment, II had typhoid and
26 died. OF the q inoculated cases,
ID, including the deaths, received
old vaccine. much interior to the
improved now used.
New possibilities in metallurgy
seem to be opened up by the Cowper-
Coles process of making iron plates
and tubes direct from the orc by
eIectrolysis. Ordinary cast iron or
iron ore. or material untitled by GER
tain ingredients for ordinary making
of high grade iron or steel. is put in
to an acid bath, and connected to the
positive pole Of dynamo. For
tubes the negative electr ode is a
wooden core covered with sheet of
lead, a similar flat surface being
provided for plates. When the tube
deposited by eleotroysis has reached
the desired thickness. it is taken
from the bath. and is then heated to
melt the lead and remove the core.
The tubes and plates cost much less
than those obtained by melting and
rolling. The iron produced is super
Tor in quality, and it Is believed to
be possible not only to utilize iron
waste aud inferior ore but to apply
the process direct to ore IN its bed,
thus making unnecessary the mining
and cleaning of ore.
1t was discovered some time ago
that the great danger OF the explosion
of compressed acetyene could be
avoided by dissolving the acetylene
in acetone. Compressed acetyle ne is
now prepared by Claude and Hess by
using steel cylinders filed with
porous mixture of infusorial earth,
special wood charcoal, and suitable
binder, aud forcing into these cy-
finders, the acetone and then the
acetylene. At ordinary temperature
aud pressure, the aostone dissolves "a
volumes of acetyleno, which is in
creased about II times at - atmos-
pheres. Ihe cylinders have capacities
OF about one-elghth, one-half and one
cubic foot, and contain respectively
y, 81 aud 100 cubic feet of acetylene,