Hawke's Bay Herald SATURDAY, MAY 6, 1899. KEELEY OUTDONE.

Hawke's Bay Herald, Volume XXXIV, Issue 11217, 6 May 1899, Page 2

Hawke's Bay Herald SATURDAY, MAY 6, 1899. KEELEY OUTDONE.

When the discovery of a method of liquifying air waß first announced, and its enormous expansive power demonstrated, Lord Playfair threw out the tentative suggestion that if a cheap method of producing it could be found it might form the motive power of the future. At that time the speculation seemed a somewhat wild one, like many scientific possibilities when first suggested, which have become so common as to cause no surprise now. In the writer's schooldays a lecturer on electricity, using the old glass disc and Leyden jars, suggested that if some machine could be invented to make the electric spark practically continuous it might be used for lighting purposes. Little did the lecturer himself think he would live to see an arc light, not to mention I the incandescent light which has superseded it for indoor illumination And Lord Playfair probably looked upon his suggestion as to the possibilities of compressed or liquified air as a dream to be realisied only in the remote future. Yet an engineer of New York, Mr Charles B. Tripler, claims to have solved the problem already, and he exhibited his machines before a gathering of scientific gentlemen at the University in that city. Mr Staunard Baker describes the invention in M' Glare's Magazine, and the picture he draws of its possibilities almost -takes o_.e's breath away. The principle is as simple as A.B.C. It lie. in the immense expansion in volume which takes place in any substance on passing from the state of liquid into the state of gas. When water passes into the gaseous state as steam we have the force which irives our steam machinory. Whon liquid air passes into the gaseous jtate we have the new force,- The

immense difference appears in the fact that to change water into steam we have to use costly artificial means to raise the temperature above 212 degrees Fahrenheit, while the transition for liquid gaseous air takes [place at 312 degrees below zero Fahrenheit. Once we have our liquid air, the temperature of the ordinary atmosphere raises it more than 300 degrees above its ordinary boiling point. Iv other words, the heat of the sun, in warming our atmosphere so much above the boiling point of liquid air, is the ultimate ' source of the new power. The expansive power of liquid air is 800 times. That is to say, one cubic foot of liquid air would expand into 800 feet of ordinary atmosphere. Of course at the full expansion it would have no force as a motive power, but it could be used at varying pressures in expansion cylinders just as steam is now in our ocean

liners.

What about the cost ? Mr Tripler claims so much under this head as to make one doubtful, if not of his sanity, at least of his honesty. He says it can produce it " practically without cost " by using liquid air to produce liquid air. This sounds un(.•ntnmonly like an announcement of ilie discovery of perpetual motion. Intense cold, partly produced by compression, on the same principle that the older type of refrigerating machines were worked, is used to liquify the air, though Mr Tripler says it is but part of the process. Once having got air liquified, he says, he has only to go on forcing air into the. machine when the cold already produced liquifies it. Three gallons of liquid air will convert sufficient atmosphere to make ten gallons. That leaves seven gallons for motive power. Mr Tripler modestly states that he does not want to claim too much, but that is theresult he has attained in his experimental machine, and he does not see why the same thing should not be done on a large scale. Of the cost Mr Baker Bays : — The first ounce of compressed air made hy Professor Dewar cost more than 3000 dollars. A little later he reduced the cost to 500 dollars a pint, and the whole scientific world rang with the achievement. Yesterday, in Mr Tripler's laboratory, I saw five gallons of liquid air poured ont like so much water. It was made at the rate of 50' gallons a dav, and it cost, perhaps, 20 cents a gallon. *

The liquid, we are told, "is nearly as heavy as water, and quite as clear and limpid'" The cold is so intense that it freezes alcohol and mercury. Iron and steel exposed to it become as brittle as glass. A tin cup filled with it in a few minutes will shiver to fragments if dropped. ijjit copper, gold, and silver are made more pliable and elastic. Steel can be burned in the liquid " exactly like a piece of pork rind — spluttering and giving a glare of dazzling brilliancy.' ' Ordinary woollen felt, which can hardly be burned in a hot fire, "explodes and burns with all the terrible violence of guncotton." These thingß are said to have been demonstrated at the gathering in the New York University. Liquid air must be uncanny stuff to handle. A few drops on a man's flesh will kill it. That indicates a uae not hitherto suggested— a most powerful cauterising medium in surgical caees. Mr Tripler says he has supplied some of it to a well-known New York physician, who entirely cured a difficult case of cancer by its use. Assuming that Mr Tripler has really succeeded in producing what he claims, or even that he has only hit upon a track which others may follow to the desired goal, the possibilities are almost limitless. Here are a few suggested by Mr Baker : —

Think of the ocean greyhound unencumbered with coal bunkers, and sweltering boilers, and smokestacks, making her power as she sails, from the free sea air around _ her ! Think of the boilerless locomotive running without fire-box or fireman, or without need of water tanks or coal chutes, gathering from the air as it passes the power whioh turns its driving wheels ! With costless power, think how travel and freight rates must fall, bringing bread and meat more cheaply to our tables and cheaply manufactured clothing more cheaply to our backs ! Think of the possibilities of aerial navigation with power whioh requires no heavy maohinery, no storage batteries, no coal ! Ten years from now hotel guests will call for cool rooms in summer with as muoh certainty of getting them as they now call for warm rooms in winter. And think of what unspeakable valne liquid air will be in hospitals. In the first place, it is absolutely pure air; in the second place, the proportion of oxygen is very large, so that it is vitalising air. Why, it will not be necessary for the tired-out man of the future to make his usual summer trip to the mountains. He oan have his ozone and his cool heights served to him in his room. Cold is always a disinfectant. Mr Tripler thinks that by the proper mixture of liquid air with cotton, wool, glycerine, or any other hydrocarbon an explosive of enormous power could be made. And, unlike dynamite or nitroglycerine, it could he handled like so

much sand, there being not the slightest danger of explosion from cononssion, although, of course, it must be kept away from fire. No more would warships be loaded down with cumbersome explosives, and no more could there be terrible explosions on ship-board, because the ammunition could be made for the guns as it was needed, a liquid-air plant on ship-board furnishing all the necessary materials.

And the list might be almost indefinitely extended. It has been the dream of the scientist that some day a method of tapping the earth's great stores of electricity may be discovered, and a practically costless and illimitable motive power obtained. But if Mr Tripler e*n do what he says, compressed air will be about as useful and uuiversally obtainable. He declares that the expanded air can be used in any engine, but boilers, water, and coal are dispensed with. One cannot help feeling a little incredulous at Mr Baker's account. Surely such a momentous discovery would bave been, flashed by cable the world over ! But one of three things is clear. Either Mr Baker has been thoroughly hoaxed, or he has invented the champion hoax of the century, or Mr Tripler has accomplished a feat which promises to revolutionise the world in many respects. "This much is certain," concludes Mr Baker. "A machine has been built which * will make

liquid air in large quantities at small expense, and an engine has been successfully run by liquid air."