Machinery = Notes. =

Progress, Volume I, Issue 9, 2 July 1906, Page 235

Machinery = Notes. =

The Patea Freezing Works are installing a new producer-gas plant, and the Eltham Dairy Co. are negotiating for a similar outfit. ***** The Brown Hoisting Machinery Company have erected two steam-hoisting machines of the gantry crane type, of 8,000 tons daily capacity, for the Kyushu Railway, Japan. The cranes are to be used for delivering coals from truck to ship. ****** The Acme Engine Company (Limited), Shettieston, Glasgow, have just received an order from Nobel's Explosives Company for two sets of engines and suction gas producers, each of 150 horse power, for driving refrigerating plant at the Ardeer works of the company. ****** Messrs. Willock, Reid, and Co. (Limited), Glasgow have recently booked some large contracts for delivery over 1906, although prices are considerably higher than those current twelve months ago. This firm are also making high-power gas engines of the Kortmg type ; also Dr. Horn's new patent tachometer, in view of the large adoption for marine work of the turbine engine. ***** A new armour-plate rolling mill, which is said to be the largest of its kind in the world, has just been completed at the works of Messrs. Cammell, Laird and Co., Sheffield. The driving engines are of 14,000 h.p., and were built by Messrs. Davy Brothers. Each roll weighs 42 tons, and between the roll-housings they are 424 ft. in length. The whole of the work, with the exception of the engines, has been built by the company. ****** There were shipped in the course of last month to South Africa, destined for Johannesburg, two very powerful gas engines, forming the last section of an installation of eight engines having an aggregate b h p. of 13,000, which Messrs Duncan Stewart and Company (1902), of London Road Iron Works, have manufactured on the Oechelhauser patents. The first and second sections of the plant have been erected in place at Johannesburg for some time, and are now about to be set to work. ****** The Associated Portland Cement Manufacturers (Limited) have made a contract with Messrs. William Beardmore and Co. (Limited), Parkhead For^e, Glasgow, for the supply of seven 400 b.h.p. Oechelhauser gas engines, together with the necessary gas producers of the Mason type, with all gas-cfeamng plant and accessories. This plant is for the Swanscombe Works of this Association, and will be the first large application of gas-driving in this industry. ****** The Oechelhauser system, as manufactured by Messrs. William Beardmore and Co. (Limited) is becoming increasingly popular in England. There are now about 60,000 h.p. in use, ranging from 250 h.p. up to 2,000 hp., all built within five years. There are no valves on this engine, which is now used for many purposes besides the running of electric generators, as, for instance, the driving of rolling mills, of mine winding engines, etc The coal consumption per brake horse power is less than 1 lb., and the waste gases may be utilised tor steam boilers. ****** The gas engine is making rapid strides in Scotland, though much of the progress made in the larger sizes of gas engines m recent years is attributed to Continental engineers. Messrs. A. Rodger and Co., Glasgow, however, make to the designs and under the patents of Professor Rowden, of Glasgow. These engines are of the inverted vertical type, and correspond to the types of steam engines for central station and marine work. They have been designed for the use of producer gas, either for pressure or suction gas plants. A large installation of these engines has been constructed for the new Argyll motor works, Glasgow, for which ten engines of 100 h.p. each are to be supplied. ****** Mr. H Cruse, of the Cruse Controllable Superheater Company, writes to the Engineer as follows . In your " Industrial Notes " of February 7, speaking of Stirling boilers, you state — ' The boilers are to have a heating surface of 36,000 square feet, bern" equal to about that contained m 40 Lancashire boilers of ordinary size." Thus badly put, the comparison is misleading and unfair to the Lanca-

shire boiler. The usual evaporative duty of a Lancashire boiler, 30' x 8' 6" x 160 lbs. per square inch working pressure, which is the ordinary size now making is 8 pounds per square foot of heating surface, the heating surface being about 1,100 square feet. The usual evaporative duty of a Stirling boiler is 4 pounds per square foot of heating surface. So that the 144,000 pounds of steam to be produced by the Stirling boilers in question would require less than 17 Lancashire boilers. In both types of boiler much higher duties are to be obtained by the assistance of forced or induced draught, air heating, and feed heating. .1. ***** Some particulars, of interest at the moment, have recently been published bearing on the use of producer gas, as a motive power, on canal boats in Germany. These boats carry a deadweight cargo of 240 tons on a draught of 6|-ft., and the engines, which are of the horizontal type, drive a single screw to give a speed of 3-J- miles per hour against the heavy currents of the Rhine between Cologne and Rotterdam. The gas producer is placed forward of the engines. The engines, which are of 80 to 100 h.p., have four horizontal cylinders placed opposite each other, bringing the crank shaft m the centre line of the boats Eleven boats are fitted with the system, with engines ranging up to iooh p The consumption of anthracite coal is 1.321b per horsepower per hour, and, taking everything into consideration — first cost interest, insurance, depreciation, lubrication, fuel, wages, etc. — it is said that the expenses work out at about one-eighth of a penny per ton mile. r ****** Messrs. Hall, Williams and Bridges write to point out that the order for seven 400 b.h.p. Oechelhauser gas engines, which the Associated Portland Cement Manufacturers (Limited) has just placed with Messrs. Beardmore and Co., will not, as stated, be the first large application of gas-driving in this industry. They point out that 18 months ago Messrs. Charles Nelson and Co. (Limited), of Stockton, near Rugby, acting on their advice, installed gas power m their cement works. The installation proved so successful and economical that a further 600b.h.p. is now being put down. The power is being generated electrically, the gas engines being made by the National Gas Engine Company (Limited), the gas plant by the Horsehay Company, and the electrical machinery by the Electric Construction Company, The installation will be at work in the course of a few weeks. — Engineering Review. ****** The " Bessemer Memorial Fund," on behalf of which an appeal was made m The Times last March for financial assistance by a distinguished and authoritative group of signatories, appears to us to be worthy of the support of the engineering profession and industry. Any conceivable criticism is at once disarmed by a consideration of the admirable objects to which it is proposed to devote the fund. These are divided into three sections as follows .—. — (a) The establishment of open international memorial scholarships for post-graduate practical work, tenable (except such as it is intended to allocate to the Royal School of Mines, the Sheffield and Birmingham Universities, the Armstrong College, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, or other approved British institutions) in any part of the British Empire, in the United States of America, and in Europe. It is intended that these scholarships shall be of such value and shall be awarded under such conditions that they will be regarded by students of any nation as a prize worth striving for, and as an incentive to the highest scientific attainment. (b) The equipment of mining and metallurgical memorial laboratories m the Royal School of Mines at South Kensington as the centre of the memorial (c) The erection of a statue of Bessemer in the new Royal School of Mines at South Kensington. ****** Mr. T.B Stoney, M.lnst. C.E I. (Raphoe Co. Donegal), in an interesting letter on the question of power for London, draws attention again to the water power m the estuary of the Thames, which could probably, he states, be made available in large quantities for industrial purposes by simple and inexpensive works. He instances those reaches of the river in which there is a mean tidal rise of i 6£ ft. In the Essex marshes, bordering the Thames, he remarks that there are extensive tracts of land at a level of several feet below high-water mark. In these marsh basins reservoirs could be constructed which would be filled by the tide every 12 hours to a depth of (say) 5 ft. at mean high water. When the tide falls, he proceeds, the outflow from these reservoirs into the sea could be used to drive pumps, which would raise water

out of the reservoirs to a height of 6 ft. above mean high water, to feed turbines. These turbines fixed at low water, would be driven under an average head of i6i ft. When the tide rises within 4 ft. of high water the discharge of the turbines into the sea would be stopped and diverted into the now empty reservoirs. By this arrangement, our correspondent concludes, the turbines would produce energy for commercial use for 24 hours continuously. — Engineering. ****** Mr. Alex. McKechnie, of the Newtown (Wellington) Brickworks, gives the following interesting corr panson of steam, electric and gas-producer powf which have been successively tried at the New Brickworks • — "The original steam engine consume > vi |- of a ton of coal per day, or nearly 4' per week, costing £4 a week. Then we pax ficated engineer a week, making th - ',ly cost of the engine £7 ; and, besides this, tL c ->tie the usual quantities of oil and water. The electric plant used 15J units per Lou. or about 134J units per day, at a cost of 3d. pei ._,;>.' equal to £1 13s. 6d. per day, or £10 17s. 9.G ■ ' week. The National gas plant consumes 4 bags crushed coke a day, or about one ton a week, ' iqs. per ton. Then there is £1 a week for a yout* who feeds the fire and looks after the engine. L addition to this, there is the cost of water and oil which averages about the same. The mill turned out a quarter more bricks than when driven by steam, and nearly double the quantity produced by the electric motor. ****** The remarkable future awaiting the steam turbine has already been forecasted to some extent by the revolution it promises to effect m marine propulsion. But in addition to this enormous field, it threatens to successfully invade another, a more restricted but scarcely less important one, on land. Engineering is informed that the Consett Iron Company have now ordered two turbo-blowing engines from Messrs. C. A. Parsons and Co., Limited. These engines will be complete with surface condensing plant and will each be capable of blowing 21,000 cubic feet of free air per minute at a normal speed of 3,000 revolutions per minute. They will be suitable for blowing against pressures ranging from 5 lbs to 15 lbs per square inch, with a steam pressure of 1201b5., and will be similar in design and construction to the turbo blowing engines which are at the present time working; at Messrs. Sir B.Samuelson and Co.'s, Messrs. Wilson, Pease, and Co.'s, and Biaenavon Company's Iron Works. We are informed that the claims made for these new blowing engines when they were first placed on the market have been fully borne out in actual working, and that it has been clearly demonstrated that with engines of the same rated output considerably more iron can be produced with turbo-blowing engines than with the reciprocating engines. The reason for this is stated to be found in the extreme flexibility of the turbine blower which enables it to deal with a volume of air much in excess of its normal quantity whenever the blast pressure is below normal, that is, of course when the blast furnace is working at its best, and at the very time when it can with advantage take extra blast. It is interesting to note that Messrs. Parsons have a large number of turbo-blowing engines and turbo-ex-hausters in course of construction at their works for the following, amongst other important firms: — Walter Scott, Limited, Leeds Steel Works ; James Dunlop and Co., Clyde Iron Works ; the Blaenavon Company frepeat order) ; Dalmellington lion Company : Mount Lyell Mining Company ; and the Rio Tinto Company.