SCOTSMAN’S INVENTION

Hokitika Guardian, 26 September 1930, Page 7

SCOTSMAN’S INVENTION

UTILISING STEAM

LONDON, September 10,

A Scottish engineer, who had laboured ever since the war upon a device for employing the steam generated bv a motor-car engine in helping to run the engine, has at last brought his invention to a point where it is ready for expert testing. If a motorist saw a man putting a gallon of watqr. into the petrol tank, says the motoring correspondent qf the “News-Chronicle,” and if he were told that the 1 ' power and efficiency of the engine were improved without carbonisation, the motorist Would label the man a simpleton. “Yet,” says the correspondent. “I have seen a simple device working in a. car which does all things, convincing leading English and American engineers, who signed statements vouching for the results. ‘lt i 9 the simplest of all gadgets, and can be fitted within half an hour. In the heater tank of the radiator, after the engine had been running, is steam, which is sucked through a valve and passes through a metal barrel condenser, thence, via. superheater, to the combustion chamber. There it smashes up the fuel into an almost perfect state of atomisation, eliminating carbonisation. “A certain quantity of water in the stenm-snturated gas, falling on the top of the niston and on the cylinder walls, seals the piston rings.” The invention is that of a Scottish scientist and locomotive engineer, Mr Robert Wood. The “News-Chronicle” estimates that the saving by this device to British motorists on fuel and decarbonising expenditure would exceed £IO,OOO- - a year.