REMARKABLE APPLICATIONS OF ELECTRICITY.

Clutha Leader, Volume XX, Issue 1034, 18 May 1894, Page 3

REMARKABLE APPLICATIONS OF ELECTRICITY.

Although modern scientific investigators have devoted much attention to Electricity, we are probably as far ns | fiver from knowing what this myst»;ri ous power really is. All that has been obtained is a fairly complete knowledge of its ways of working, and with this knowledge has come a rapid extension of its industrial applications, since it has been found to be a natural force which is pre-eminently adaptable and easily controlled. Great improvements may confidently be looked for in the near future*, especially in the cheapness of its production, and there is the possibility of discoveries which may appear to us as wonderful as the telegraph and telephone when they were first introduced. Even nov, when electrical engineering may be said to be but in its infancy, electricity is being used in a great variety of minor ways, besides its more prominent uses in telegraphy, telephony, and public and private lighting. As a motorpower it is rapidly taking the place of steam for putting in motion machinery of all kinds, though as yet steam-power has to be used, in the first instance, for its production. It would be impossible, within moderate bounds, to enumerate all the different purposes for which electricity is actually being used; or for which it has experimentally been found suitable though not yet put into actual use, and only some of its more interesting applications are here referred to. The use of electricity for household purposes has hardly got beyond the experimental stage, save in the department of lighting ; but enough has been done to show what a transformation may be worked by its aid when it will be possible to have houses heated by it. Then the mere turning on of a switch will suffice ; and the current, passing through a suitable heater, which may be as ornamental as means and taste permit, or, if desired, entirely concealed, will do the rest, superseding fires, with all their attendant trouble, smoke, and dust. With regard to cooking, there are numerous appliances already devised, and only waiting for the cheapening of the current to b# widely taken advantage of. Each cooking utensil, being constructed with the heating coil as part of it, is its o^n stove • and the whole array of pots and pans need only to have the connection made, and the cooking can go on under the most perfect control. Some of the possible arrangements even appear to put a premium on laziness, for, with the food put in the cooking utensils at night, and the necessary connections made, the turning of a switch in the morning in th« bedroom starts the cooking of the breakfast. A New York lady is said to -have so contrived matters that she can, before getting out of bed, start a fire going in the kitchen by turning on the current ; and when she comes down-stairs, finds the kettle boiling and the place comfortably warmed. The heating powers of the electric current are also turned to account for raising to the desired temperature hand-stamp, curling-irons, brandingirons, and the like ; while in large laundries electrically heated irons hare been found very economical, as they maintain for hours at a time the exact amount of heat suitable for the work, thus saving the ironers much time and trouble. The electric light lends itself admirably to household decoration. Among other curious displays is a table decoration in which jelly is illuminated by a light, shining through the mass from the centre ; and when the dish, at first hidden by a silver cover and a mass of flowers, is suddenly uncovered, the effect is very striking. Edison is said on one occasion to have had on the table an aquarium in which were goldfish, each of which had in some way been made to swallow a tiny electric lamp connected with a dynamo by a hair-like wire passing out out of its mouth. When the current was turned on, the fish presented a strange appearance, their delicate bodies showing all the minute details of their anatomy. The use of very small secondary batteries provide means for startling effects in personal decoration, by lighting up jewels and flowers, as has been ! largely done on the stage ; and even walking sticks have been furnished with small incandescent lamps. Medical science has called electricity to its assistance in many ways. Various surgical instruments are heated by it ; and the use of very small incandescent lamps, which give out practically no heat, permits more extended examination of internal parts than is possible in any other way. The use of the microphone has revealed sounds in the. heart, lungs, and other organs which have hitherto escaped the most sensitive ear using the ordinary intsruments. In Bussia a lady was saved from premature burial by means of a microphone placed over her heart, which enabled a man to detect a faint beat, which had escaped the ordinarytests. Though recent experiments have demonstrated the absurdity of much that passes for medical use of magnetism,

electricity has been- employed as a curative agent in various ways. One of the most curious is the electric-light bath. The virtues of sunlight are well known, and there is supposed to ha sufficient similarity between the light of the sun and the electric light to made the eieetric-l'ght bath serve as a readily available substitute for the sun bath. A closet of sufficient siae to accommodate a person, constructed of polished nickel to give a good reflecting surface, is fitted up with a number of sixteen-candle incandescent lamps, so arrangpd as to take up the least possible room and afford the largest possible radiating surface, while the temperature can be regulated by passing the current through a resistance coil. As the temperature in the encL sure can pasily be raised in 10 minutes to 150 degrees Fahrenheit, the result is equivalent to a combined light and vapour bath. The skin is browned as if by sun-burning, and the effect is claimed to be most sulutary. Another recent development is the use of electricity as a local anaesthetic. Painless operations have been ' conducted under its influence, and similar applications with suitable apparatus have induced cessation of pain in acute tic douloureux. Remarkable cures have also been obtained in such painful maladies as lumbago and rheumatism by simply pressing a small, specially shaped, incandescent lamp on the skin over the seat of the pain. It has bepn found that sufferers from 'shaking paiayiV are much better after a rough railway journey; and the late Dr Ohareot of the Salpetriere, Paris, the famous specialist in nervous diseases, applied this principle in the construction of a bed to which a rapid vibratory movement is given by means of electricity ; and this shaking, which to a person in good health would be intolerable, proves quite, enjoyable to the paralytic subject, who appears to be refreshed by it. Anothsr French physician has devised a vibrating helmet for the cure of nervous headache. ' It is constructed of strips of steel, put in vibration by a small electro-motor, which makes 600 turrsa minute. The fensation, which is not unpleasant, produces drowsiness ; the patient falls asleep under its influence, and awakes free from pain. An American inventor has brought out a rocking-chair actuated by electricity, and at the same time receives gentle currents by grasping metal handles, or j by resting the bare feet' on metal pedals. Remarkable results have been obtained from experiments regarding the influence of electricity on the growth of plants. Professor Spechneff, at Kiev, by an arrangement of poles connected by wires, condensed atmospheric electricity over the enclosed area ; and the ! ordinary grain crops grown within the enclosure showed an increase of from 28 to 56 per cent, in the weight of the yield of grain, and from 16 to 60 per cent, in the weight of the straw. Potatoes showed an increase of only 1 1 per cent., but they wore free from a parasite which devoured the unelectrified crop. By exposing plants at night to the electric light, thus supplementing sunlight, assimilation and growth became continuous, with consequent great increase in the produce ; but it has to be noted that, as in plants under normal conditions assimilation and growth alternate at different periods of the day, the great development of tissues under the double influence, cannot be entirely beneficial Professor Spechneff also tried the effect of electrifying seeds before planting, and found that when they were subjected to the current for only two minutes the rapidity of their growth was nearly doubled. Electrifying the earth in which vegetables were grown had also a prodigious effect, the harvest of roots being four times superior to the ordinary, and that of the leaves, etc., two or three times. In France the De Meriten system of treating wines by passing currents of electricity through them has been officially tested, and reported on favorably. This treatment is found to mellow and preserve healthy wines, and to arrest deterioration in those beginning to give way. Alcohol has also been experimented with, showing a considerable hastening of the maturing processes, the objectionable fusel oils, which render new spirits almost undrinkable, being rapidly converted into complete alcohols. Another industrial purpose to which electricity has been applied of late is tanning, in which it much shortens the time required in the ordinary way. Some measure of success has also attended experiments in I purifying sewage by its use. The well-known attraction, which light has for fish has induced ingenious fishermen to utilise the electric light as a bait, and it is said that this never fails to bring together large shoals of fish, which swim round the illuminated globe, and are easily caught. The ingenious Yankee is never behindhand in odd adaptations, and a patent has been taken out in the States for a mechanical pickpocket and coatthief detecter — an electrical apparatus which automatically rings an alarm bell when the bearer's personal property is tampered with. Another inventive genius so combined elecricity and photography as to secure a flash-light photograph of thieves at work in hi g office. When they opened a glass case they completed an electric circuit which

exposed the camera, and simultaneously kindlpd the flash-light, to the great alarm of the depredators. There was recently exhibited to the Royal Society an automatic; hardor watchman, named the ' hydrophore,' which is so constructed that when a torpedo boat approaches within half-a-mile, or a man-of-war within a, mile, the vibrations of the screw-propellor i are detected and transmitted to the signalling station. Electricity has further been used in the industrial processes of engraving, beaching, dyping, the reduction of ores, and the purification of metals. Mainly by its aid, alumininum can now be produced at a price which is no longer prohibitire. Prior to 1855 it sold at three hundred and sixty shillings per pound ; by 1862 it had fallen to twenty shillings per pound, while now it costs only a shilling or two. The cheapest chemical methods of producing it cannot compare with the electrical. By the use of electricity for welding, what is in effect a new power has been put into the hands of mechanicians and constructors. It was formerly considered that only iron, steel, and platinum could be firmly welded, while now nearly every known metal and alloy has been successfully welded by the help of electricity. An electric ventilator has been devised for supplying buildings with fresh air, cold or warm, as may be desired. An electric motor sets the ventilator revolving, and the revolution sucks cool air in. When warm air is desired a current of electricity is sent into a network of fine wire, through which air must puss, heating the wires, and these impart their heat to the air. For the detection of underground ores an ' electrical finder ' has been devised. The mechanism of this instrument includes a telephone, which is silent in the absence of metal or magnetic ore ; but if such be present, induced currents arise, which produce sounds in the telephone which are recognisable by experts. What should prove a most tiseful industrial development is the application of electricity to the cleansing and preservation of boilers. The method employed is the sending of currents periodically through the shell of the boiler. -By this means the scale formed on the shell and tubes is disintegrated and easily removed. — Chambers Journal.