BRITISH FORWARD MOVEMENT.

Dunstan Times, Issue 3130, 14 August 1922, Page 7

BRITISH FORWARD MOVEMENT.

One of the fundamental problems for the electrical engineer is to change alternating current into continuous or direct current. This change has to bo made for a variety of reasons, and it is exceptionally important in the case of electric railway working, where many engineers advocate the use of direct current at very high pressure. Two British engineers have been devoting their attention to tins matter and have devised a machine which provides far and away the most efficient means of producing high pressure direct current from the alternating current generally produced bv steam turbine-driven electric generators. It is impossible to describe this machine without elaborate technicalities, but we may state that the first machine made, which has been under test successfully for about 15 months, changes alternating into direct current at 100,000 volts with an efficiency of about 95 per cent. The-origi-nal design was so excellent that subsequent tests have not led to any material alterations. This machine, which is called a “Transverter” because it first transforms and then converts the current, is expected to be of immense value to the electrification of railways and.also in linking-up of electric power stations which is so necessary to economy in the public supply of electricity. This machine may therefore be regarded a shaving passed through the experimental stage. Machines with an output of over 700 horse-power are expected to be at work in the near future. * * * * Railway engineers are in fairly general agreement that creosoting is the most satisfactory method of preserving timber which has to be used in places we re fungus and various insect enemies can easily got at it. It Is also recognised that the process, to really effective, must be carried out in carefully designed plant. There was recently erected and tested before shipment abroad a large British plant which is capable of creosoting nine hundred sleepers per day of eight hours, these sleepers being large enough for lines with a gauge of one metre. The machine comprises two large receptacles, one above the other, the lower one being the working cylinder, which is thirty-six feet long and capable of withstanding a pressure of two hundred pounds per square inch. The top receptacle contains the creosote; and one charge can be completely transferred from this cylinder to the lower in eight minutes. The boiler, which is provided to supply steam for the pumps, is designed to burn wood waste, and the whole of the plan is produced so as to withstand the most severe service. « * * * In no country, perhaps, is the Civil Service noted for originality in any direction ; and most of the inventions which are adopted by Government Departments have come from outside sources. The British faculty for invention crops up, however, in the most unlikely places'. A case occurred recently in Great Britain where a. retired member of the Post Office spent hits pensioned leisure in devising a better way of performing one of the moot elementary operations in a central post office —the sorting of letters into bundles, each for a particular locality, and the distribution of these bundles to the right place for dispatch on the appropriate mail vans. Thin earnest official had probably noticed that the usual arrangements in sorting offices were far from perfect. The mechanism was so arranged that the sorting clerks could readily, unless they were most careful, send a bundle intended for some northern district on to the track laid for southern district letters. As much as half an hour would be wasted in correcting such mistakes, which might easily lead to the loss of an important mail for the erring bundle. AVith the new, mechanism, which was demonstrated recently in London, England, to a number of Post Office experts, it becomes difficult instead of easy for the sorting clerk fi to make mistakes. The whole of the complicated business of bringing order out of the chaos of letters is thus simplified, accelerated, and made more accurate. AVith each increase in the size of liners, the dock accommodation at Southampton, England, has been extended, or rather it should he stated that the development, at Southampton docks has always been in advance of the actual necessities. A scheme is now on foot for the construction of new docks which will accommodate not only the biggest boats now afloat but as many more of the largest possible size as are likely to he constructed within the’ next ten years or so. A series of oblique jetties is contemplated, and the scheme also includes the construction of new graving docks larger than anything at present available. These graving docks will enable repair work to be carried out on the: largest liners; and their facilities are to lie supplemented by a huge floating dock. Important developments are also on foot in connection with the Liverpool docks. AAhirk is already in an advanced stage in connection with graving docks and with an enlarged entrance to the new dock system, enabling the largest liners to go in and out of dock no matter what the state of the tide may be. The magnitude of this new work may he gathered from the fact that at least two more years will be occupied in completing it. * *- *- -XFrom the scientific point of view alcohol is an excellent fuel for motor cars and other machines driven by internal combustion engines. In view of tbe importance of the subject, Great Britain has organised careful research not only into the uses of alcohol of different strengths and in different types of engines, but into the possibility, of finding some source of alcohol which will be cheap and abundant. This research is being assisted by a Government grant, and it lias already produced some highly interesting results. The efficiency of fuel alcohol is in fact higher than that of either petrol or benzol. A new series of experiments is now in hand with a view to investigating the influence of ether on alcohol, and also the influence of ijjcoliol mixed with petrol, benzol, parafffin and other familiar oils. In connection with the fuel question it is interesting to note that discoveries of oil deposits have rewarded the patient investigation which has been carried out for some time in Great Britain. In one part of Scotland oil has been met with at a depth of over 1800 feet ,and the oil is stated to be of excellent quality with a bigli percentage of petrol kerosene and lubricating oil.^ The ordinary small hand-operated drill is widely' used on account of its convenience, but it has the drawback that it is not quite so accurate in its work as a proper machine drill. AA ith the object of getting over this disability a British firm of tool-makers has designed a new type of hand-drill \\ Inch does as good work as the high grade machine drill, while retaining all the simplicity of tbe hand-drill. Both a high and a low speed are provided; and another verv useful feature is the automatic action by which the drill is fed forward as it proceeds through the work. The work table of tins little machine can be swung to any angle and also rotated round a vertical column,

so that the drilling of holes at any angle is a comparatively easy matter. The machine is designed for hard work and can drill holes up to lin in diameter. The height of the machine is only 40in, and it is made throughout with exactly the same minute care as is expended on the best British machine tools.