LECTURE ON ELECTRICITY.

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume III, Issue 287, 14 August 1882, Page 2

LECTURE ON ELECTRICITY.

I ■. ' .! ■ f ft In accordance with his promise, Mr. T. X* Jeffs met a number of gentlemen at the Institute on Saturday evening, with a view to explaining 'the Bfash system of electric lighting. His Worship the Mayor took the chair. The lecturer began by explaining the Brush -electrical machine/ which engendered, or rather induced the electricity. He ppimted; out tho.t an 'armature consisting of an iron ring,.- whioh was bound round in sections with" fiopper wire, was the" mean's by'wbich the current Wa*s produced. It' was- Bet' m'mbtfdn by machinery, and contact was 'formed and broken- with two powerful magnets, each time the bands- of popper wire passed, the ends, .of the, magnets. The electricity so produced was taken up by these powerful electro-magnets, ' and from thence was transmitted into copper brushes, whioh in turn passed it on 1 into the wires, through which' it waß transmitted to consumers! One of the chief difficulties which electricians had had to contend with, was the difficulty of regulating the combustion ot^ the carbons or eleotric candles. This had beeja -overcome by means of a galvano-meter, by which tbe feed for combustion of tbe carbons had been made proportionate to the current induced. The' greater the speed of the revolutions, and the conse- .* quent supply of electricity! the quicker the feed of carbons to meet the require- | ments of the combustion. He proceeded to give a full list of the cost of the apparatus which he would recbmm'ehd^or a i town such as Hawera, which could be well lighted by four 13rush lights on ! suitable elevations. He. recommended the, proposed company, if they thought fit, ' I to order Brush electric, light apparatus I from Messrs. Oppenheimer' and Co., and to apply for machine 78, scheduled at £720, 4 lamps with parabolic reflectors to cost £108, 25 miles of line wire to cost about i'7o, and other fixings, insulators, brackets, [etc., amounting altogether, to £968. If a motor was needed, he re- • commended a double turbine with 104 square-inch vent, to cost £62 10s., which would work up to 80 horse-power or more. He estimated the total costs at £1035, to which freight, . labor, cost of telegraph poles, &c, (would have to be added. ■ For private use the Swan- Incandescent lamps were the most . suitable. In reply to Mr. Parrington, Mr. Jeffs said that the distance of the generator did not much matter, as the power could be transmitted 10 miles if necessary. In reply to other questions^ the lecturer Btated that by the system -which he recommended the cost would be £d. per hour per burner. The only cost of lighting was the cost of the carbons, plus the cost of the motive power transmitted. — The cost of lighting any one house would dopend on the amount consumed ; their sale could be regulated just as the sale of gas could be regulated by bye-laws.— 20,000 candle power would be the maximum amount of candle power which the maohine he recommended would.be able to .transmit — for a Brush light not less than 2000 candle power was recommended. — The carbons were supplied only to customers of the machine, It would be open to any private person to use a small Brush machine if they -wished for one. He thought a certaim amount of protection should be provided against any one stealing the light. Persons might steal gas from the main in .the same manner, bat the law would protect the gas or the > electrio oompany. He held that it would j be competent to any person who wished to establish a small light for themselves, just as a. private iudiyidual might set up a small gas machine if they wished fotlo. Ho quoted prices of. electric companies' shares from the British Trade, Journal of the Ist Juue, to show what the public thought, pf. the prospects of these companies. For instanqe, the American Company's paid-up capital of £238,000 was quoted on the 16th bf May, as worth £1,721,000. Again, the Hamond Company, only two months' old on the Ist of June, with a paid-up capital of £45,000, was on- the same date as the former, i.e., the 16th of llay, wprth '£387,000. Afyor an itegrtlar discussion, Mr. Bate proposed -a ; vote of thanks to the lecturer "for the interesting lecture which he had given. Ho felt sure that . 'many present bad derived a great deal of useful- information from, what had been •said, and that though, aB l£v. Jeffs had said, it was a matter of business for him, yet the lecture was interesting, in itself, apart from the company which Mr. Jeffs represented. ' ' ' -. ..;.;' . *