Various

“ Of all the inventions of ancient or modern times none have more importantly and beneficently influenced the affairs of mankind than the double acting high pressure steam engine, the locomotive, the steam railway system, and the steamboat, all of which inventions are of American origin. ”

“ It is only after a long apprenticeship that a reeler succeeds in throwing the end properly. The thread produced by the several filaments is itself so fine that its size cannot readily be judged by the eye, and the speed with which it is being wound renders this even more difficult. But, in order to have an idea of the size, the reeler watches the cocoons as they unwind, counts them, and, on the hypothesis that the filament of one cocoon is of the same diameter as that of another, gets an approximate idea of the size of the thread that she is reeling. ”

“ There is every reason to suppose that we are about to witness a transformation in the art of silk reeling, a change similar to that which has already been brought about in the spinning of other threads, and of which the consequences will be of the highest importance. ”

“ Since spinning machinery, as usually constructed for other fibers, could not be employed in the manufacture of raw silk, and as the countries where silk is produced are, generally speaking, not the seat of great mechanical industries, where the need of special machinery would be quickly recognized and supplied, silk reeling (the making of raw silk) has been passed by, and has never become an industrial art. It remained one of the few manual handicrafts, while yet serving as the base of a great and staple industry of worldwide importance. ”

“ Then, again, we may, reckoning a certain constant amount of heat lost per each revolver furnace of the small size, consider that if we doubled the size of such revolver, we should lose by no means double the amount of heat lost with the small apparatus; but only the same as that lost in the small furnace plus a certain fraction of that quantity, which will be smaller the better and more efficient the arrangements are. Then, again, there is an economy in iron plate for such a large revolver; there is economy in expense on the engine power and on fuel consumed, as well as in wear and tear. ”

“ If we cannot express a law, we can at least, through statistics, find out, approximately, the age of a person if we know the extent of the accommodation of his eyes.
A Dutch oculist, Donders, has got up a table in which, opposite the amplitudes, the corresponding ages are found. Now, the Javal-Bull optometer permits of a quick determination of the value of the amplitude of accommodation in dioptries. (A dioptrie is the power of a lens whose focal distance is one meter.)
The first idea of this apparatus is due to the illustrious physicist Thomas Young, who flourished about a century ago. ”

“ The high pressure steam engine in its stationary form is almost ubiquitous in America. In all great iron and steel works, in all factories, in all plants for lighting cities with electricity, in brief, wherever in the United States great power in compact form is wanted, there will be found the high pressure steam engine furnishing all the power that is required, and more, too, if more is demanded, because it appears to be equal to every human requisition. ”

“ It is certain that in the open ocean the great tide wave could not be recognized as a wave, since it is merely a temporary alteration of the sea level.
Waves which have their origin in the action of the wind striking the surface of the water commence as a series of small and slow undulations or wavelets—a mere ripple. As the strength, and consequently the pressure, of the wind increases, waves are formed; and a numerical relation exists between the length of a wave, its velocity of progress, and the depth of the water in which it travels.
The height of a wave is measured from trough to crest ”

“ I can get out of a storage battery almost any horse power I like for a short space of time. I have not the least objection to the direct system. But when you come to run twenty or thirty or fifty cars on one line, you will require very large conductors or dangerously high electromotive force. The overhead system is applicable to its own particular purposes. Where there are only five or ten, or even twenty, cars running on one line, and that line runs through a suburb or a part of a city where there are not many houses, that system is to be preferred. ”

“ The making of the primary thread is the foundation of all textile processes, and it is on the possibility of doing this by automatic machinery that England's great textile industries depend. The use of highly developed machinery for spinning cotton, wool, and flax has grown to be so much a part of our conception of modern life, as contrasted with the times of our grandfathers, as often to lead to the feeling that a complete and universal change has occurred in all the textile industries. ”

“ In regard to using two motors on a car, there are several advantages in it. I use two motors on all my cars in Europe, and always have done so from the beginning. One of the advantages is that in case of an accident to one motor the other will bring the car home; secondly, with two motors we can vary the speed without changing the E.M.F. of the battery. If I want very much power, I put two motors in parallel, getting four times the power that I do with one machine, and an intermediate power of two motors. ”

“ For nine pounds of silk, she reels a length of filament sufficient to girdle the earth. The manufacturer, therefore, cannot and must not depend only on the constant attention that each reeler should give to the work confided to her care. He is obliged to have overseers who constantly watch the reelers, so that the defects in the work of any single reeler, who otherwise might not give the attention required by her work, will not greatly diminish the value either of her own work or that of several other reelers whose silk is often combined to form a single lot. ”

“ Roasting takes the place of fine crushing, as the ore from the roasting furnace is either found somewhat spongy in texture or the grains of silica in which fine gold may be incased are split or flawed by the fire. For quicksilver amalgamation very fine crushing is necessary to bring all gold particles in contact with it. Quicksilver being so thick in substance, it will not find its way readily in and out of a microscopically fine spongy body or through very fine flaws in grains of silica, whereas chlorine gas or a solution of liquefied chlorine does this, and absorbs the gold far more readily. ”

“ The progress in sanitation on the Continent, America, and the colonies has not been coincident with the progress in England, but these countries have largely benefited by the experience of the United Kingdom, and in some respects their specialists take more extreme views than those of this country in matters of detail. This is, perhaps, more particularly the case with the Americans, who have devised all sorts of exceptional details in connection with private drainage, in order to protect the interior of the houses from sewer gas, and to perfect its ventilation. ”

“ In southern countries the reproduction of silkworms is a vast industry to which great attention is given, and which receives important and regular aid from the government. It is, however, quite distinct from the manufacturing industry with which at present we have to do. The cocoons to be used for reeling, i.e., all but those which are reserved for reproduction, are in the first place "stifled," that is to say, they are put into a steam or other oven and the insect is killed. The cocoons are then ready for reeling, but those not to be used at once are allowed to dry. ”

“ In fact, it was stated at the time that the question of reeling silk presented a striking analogy to the question of cotton before the invention of the "gin." It will be remembered that cotton raising was several times tried in the United States, and abandoned because the fiber could not be profitably prepared for the market. The impossibility of competing with India and other cheap labor countries in this work became at least a fact fully demonstrated, and any hope that cotton would ever be produced in America was confined to the breasts of a few enthusiasts. ”

“ Considered as a heat engine, the efficiency of the most economical steam motor is but ten per cent.—90 per cent of the available units of heat contained in coal being lost during its transformation into mechanical energy. Thus, if we find that the storage battery does not return more than 70 per cent, of the work expended in charging it, we ought not to condemn it on that account until we have ascertained whether this low efficiency renders the system unfit for any or all commercial purposes. ”

“ You will be surprised to know that two horses, when doing their easiest work, drawing a loaded car on a perfectly level road, exert from two to three horse power. I have mentioned a car in Philadelphia where we use between two and twelve horse power. A horse is capable of exerting eight horse power for a few minutes, and when a car is being driven up grades, such as I see in Boston, for instance, pulling a load of passengers up these grades, the horses must be exerting from 12 to 16 horse power, mechanical horse power. ”

“ It was the dynamo machine which created the demand for the storage battery, and the latter was introduced anew to the public at large and to the capitalist with great pomp and enthusiasm. One of Faure's accumulators was sent to Sir William Thomson, and this eminent scientist in the course of experiments ascertained that a single cell, weighing 165 lb., can store two million foot-pounds of energy, or one horse power for one hour, and that the loss of energy in charging did not exceed 15 per cent. ”

“ It does not, however, seem to be so readily or universally conceded that a plentiful supply of fresh air is of equal importance, and that the great aim and object of sewer ventilation should be the introduction of atmospheric air for the purpose of diluting and oxidizing the air of the sewers, and the creation of a current to some exit, which shall, if possible, either be above the roofs of the houses, or, still better, to some point where the sewer gas can be cremated. ”

“ The cement so made possessed extraordinary strength and hardness, and it has been a matter of surprise that iron masters and others have not adopted such a means of converting a waste material—which at the present time entails upon its producers constant heavy outlay for its removal—into a remunerative branch of industry by the expenditure of a comparatively small amount of capital. ”

“ An electric contact is closed by a slight movement of the lever whenever the thread requires a new filament of cocoon, and broken again when the thread has been properly strengthened. It is evident that a delicate faller movement might be employed to set the feed mechanism in motion instead of the electric circuit, but, under the circumstances, as the motion is very slight and without force, being, in fact, comparable to the swinging of the beam of a balance through the space of about the sixteenth of an inch, it is simpler to use a contact. ”

“ In the car which we use in Philadelphia there are actually 80 cells, because there are considerable gradients to go over. Each cell weighs 40 pounds and the average horse power of each battery is six. Sometimes we only use two horse power and sometimes, going up grades of 5 per cent., we use as much as 12 horse power, but the average rate is 6 electrical horse power. With reference to the weight of passengers on the cars, we have never carried more than 50 passengers on that car, because it is impossible to put more than 50 men into it. ”

“ As regards going up an incline, of course stopping and starting again has to be done often, and anybody who at any time works cars by electricity, whether they have storage batteries or not, has to allow for sufficient motive power to overcome all the difficulties that any line might present.
One of the great mistakes which some of the pioneers in this direction made was that they did not put sufficient power upon the cars. You always ought to put on the cars power capable of exerting perhaps 20 to 40 per cent. ”

“ For some years past work has been done in France in developing an automatic silk-reeling machine, and incomplete notes concerning it have from time to time been published. That the accounts which were allowed to reach the outer world were incomplete will cause no surprise to those who know what experimental work is—how easily and often an inventor or pioneer finds himself hampered by premature publication. ”

“ The older processes required a careful damping of the ore, which, to get good results, must leave the ore neither too wet nor too dry. Now "damping" is entirely done away with, and in its place water is poured into the barrel. Pressure to the extent of four atmospheres causes chlorine gas to leave its vaporous form. Thus the pressure applied not only enables a strong solution of chlorine to be formed with the water in the barrel, but forces this into contact with the gold through every crevice in the ore. Chlorine gas also takes up any silver which may exist in association with the gold. ”

“ The advantage of using charcoal as a decomposing agent for chloride of gold was pointed out by Mr. Newbery some twenty years ago; four or five years since the idea was patented in the United States, but as this was given gratis to the world years before, the patent did not hold good. The form of precipitation generally adopted was to add sulphate of iron to the liquid drawn from the filter. This not only threw down the gold it contained, but also the lime and magnesia. Then very great care was necessary, and a tedious process had to be gone through to divide the gold from these. ”

“ There is one great textile industry—one of the most staple and valuable—still in the primitive condition of former times, and employing processes and apparatus essentially the same as those known and employed before such development had taken place. We mean the art of silk reeling. The improvements made in the production of threads of all other materials have only been applied to silk in the minor processes for utilizing waste ”

“ If we were to make a lead battery of plates 1⁄4 inch thick, it would last many years; but for street car work that would be far too heavy. Therefore we make the positive plates a little more than one-eighth of an inch thick. I find that the plates get sufficiently brittle to almost fall to pieces after the car has run fifteen hours a day for six months. The plates then have to be renewed. But this renewal does not mean the throwing away of the plates. The weight is the same as before, because no consumption of material takes place. We take out peroxide of lead instead of red lead. ”

“ Thousands of operatives are constantly employed in forming up these threads by hand, adding filament by filament to the thread as required, while watching the unwinding from the cocoon of many miles of filament in order to produce a single pound of the raw silk thread, making up the thread unaided by any mechanical device beyond a simple reel on which the thread is wound as finished, and a basin of heated water in which the cocoons are placed. ”