PHILOSOPHICAL INSTITUTE.

Globe, Volume XXI, Issue 1688, 18 July 1879, Page 3

PHILOSOPHICAL INSTITUTE.

The usual monthly meeting of the Philosophical Institute took place last night iu the Lecture Theatre of the College Laboratory. There was a fair attendance. Mr T. S. Oleminshaw read a very interesting paper on the Manufacture and Economical Consumption of Coal Gas. He commenced by reviewing the early history of the rise and progress of the discovery of artificial illumination. Prom thence he proceeded to detail one or two of the early experiments which led to the practical development of gas as a light giving agent. It was only during the last decade of the eighteenth century that any really practical results wore arrived at. The earliest investigator was a Mr Murdoch, and after him came Clegg, to whom gas lighting owes most of its advancement. Westminster bridge was lit in 1813, and in 1820 gas illumination was first used in Paris, and at the same time introduced in the House of Commons. Curious ideas seemed to exist at the time; amongst them was the fear that people had of touching the pipes that conveyed the gas through the building, and members were seen carefully trying the temperature of the pipes to see if they were not on fire. The lecturer then proceeded to give a resume of the method of manufacturing gas at the present time, and instancing the vast development of gas manufacture, he stated that at the works at Beckton-on-Thames, 2500 tons of coals were manipulated throughout a day’s working, which necessitated the employment of locomotives running through the retort houses. The retorts and their appendages were next described in the order of manufacture. The various modes adopted for cleansing and purifying the gas were next explained, traversing through the whole of the plant to the gas holders. Before leaving the subject of the works the lecturer described the photometer as a means of testing the quality of the gas. Next in order came the mains or arteries of the system, and which were described as varying from an inch and a quarter up to even six feet in diameter. The consideration of the uses to which gas could be put was next dealt with—as a motive power, for culinary purposes, for heat and light giving. The subject of metres was next discussed, and for the purpose of illustration the lecturer exhibited one taken to pieces, describing the parts. The remainder of the lecture was devoted to some valuable practical information useful to be known by gas consumers, as it explained many problems that are apt to puzzle persons unacquainted with the theory and practice of the use of gas. After the lecture the rooms in connection with the laboratory were thrown open to the public, and some interesting experiments were made.