PETROLEUM AS FUEL.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1003, 19 December 1910, Page 6

PETROLEUM AS FUEL.

SUCCESSFUL TRAIN RUN. An interesting account of a trial hill on a iocomotivc using Taranaki petroleum is contained in a letter from Mr. D. Berry, formerly chairman of the Taranaki Petroleum Company, published recently in the Taranaki "Herald." The engine left Wellington with a load of 130 tons, and the rirsl tiling which struck Jlr. Berry on the journey was the absence nr brnoM, smell, and fumes of any kind when passing through tunnels. "The oil," said the writer in the course' of his narrative, "is contained 'in ivhal ra# boforo iko coat bunker, and from thence is conveyed to the firebox with a jet of.steam and also air. Here the burner, with an aperture of about-4iri. in width by about "5-10ths of an inch, atomises the three, and an intense heat is generated, so hot that it would destroy metal, so a baffle is made of firebrick to tako the first impact, after which it passes to the boiler tubes." We were taking some very steep grades—one; I know, is 1 in 57—with a maximum load for a W.F. of. 200 tons, but it made- not tho slightest difference; tho steam gauge showed from■'■l7Blb.' to 1801b. to tho square inch almost without variation, while all the fireman had to do, except attending to the brake, was to turn a lever about tho size of the handle of my fountain pan; about a quarter of an inch or less, over a craduated sector plate."