A RIVAL TO COAL GAS.

Otago Witness, Issue 1822, 22 October 1886, Page 15

A RIVAL TO COAL GAS.

It is understood Mr Kerr, M.H.R., who bought the Hooker gas patent over New Zealand for £5000, has been offered that sum for the Auckland right alone. The patentee, who has met with considerable opposition on various grounds, has succeeded in attracting favourable attention to his invention from the Government, who have consented to try it at Seacliff Asylum, where ordinary gasmaking apparatus was to have been erected at a cost of something like £2000. A number of private people are beginning to use it here for houses which aie not supplied from the gas mains. Tim apparatus was fitted up during the session at the Parliamentary buildings, and a remarkably good light was produced. The principle is identical with that of the blowpipe, by which gas is diluted with air to a very large extent, and a patent burner curving downwards with a thin platinum foil over the aperture is used. The foil is pierced with a number of holes, through which the gas issues, and the effect is to produce a brilliant incandescent light, perfectly steady and shadowless. The curious thing is that the burner must curl downwards or the light roars loudly. Ordinary coal gas may be employed, but Mr Hooker got the best effect from gas obtained by simply forcing air through oil,' which can be burned at once without any intermediai c process of purification, &c. The inventor estimates that such gas costs about Is per 1000 ft. He himself has lighted his own residence for many months by this process, a pair of bellows and a small holder being the only apparatus used. Objections are raised to the new light that the gas is dangerously explosive, but the patentee denies that Ihere is any more risk than with coal gas. Mr Hooker is now negotiating with the Blenheim corporation to establish works to light the town on lite pyfifcem,