SCIENCE SIFTINGS

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XLIX, Issue 35, 7 September 1922, Page 46

SCIENCE SIFTINGS

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ARTIFICIAL NATURAL GAS. ; f Natural gas is properly called methane and is a compound ; consisting of one atom of carbon united -to four atoms of hydrogen. According to the German technical papers, this is now being manufactured for commercial purposes, being delivered in steel carboys under a pressure of 125 to 150 atmospheres. The caloric value of methane 1 is three times as great as that of hydrogen and twice as great as that of the best illuminating gas. It is entirely free from sulphur compounds and the dangerous cyanogen compounds, and for this reason it does not injure plants nor tarnish silverware as ordinary illuminating gas does. Best of all, perhaps, from the consumer’s point of view, is the fact that by its use the latter is- freed from the various annoyances connected with the ordinary city supply. The normal carboy having a content of 10 gallons holds from 500 to 600 gallons of compressed methane, which corresponds in caloric value to 12,000 gallons of the best illuminating gas furnished in cities. It can be easily used $ to supply most incandescent lamps, whether these are suspended or fixed on stands. The methane can also be readily used in most forms of cooking and heating apparatus as well as to supply laboratory burners. WONDERFUL ALUMINIUM. There is more aluminium in the earth’s crust than any other metal, but 40 years ago it was practically unknown (writes H. Williamson in Everyday Science). It was looked upon as a chemical curiosity, and was worth more than its weight in gold. It is related that the Emperor Francis Joseph, when a child, had an aluminium rattle that cost £2OOO. To-day the consumption of aluminium runs into many thousands of tons annually, and the cost is a little more than a shilling a pound. It is a metal of extraordinarily varied uses, many of which are quite unsuspected by the general public. Rolled into sheets, everybody knows it in the form of aluminium cooking vessels or motor-car bonnets. But it can also be rolled into sheets almost as thin as tissue paper; and much of the “tinfoil” or “silver paper” used for wrapping sweets and cigarettes is nowadays aluminium foil. Pounded into flakes or granules, it reveals entirely different properties. The tiny, thin flakes are the basis of aluminium paint, but they are also highly inflammable, and violently explosive if suspended in air. The flakes are used in fireworks, and cause beautiful starshaped, bluish-white sparks. The granules are no less combustible. They form the principal ingredient in, the powerful explosive ammonal, and they combine with black oxide of iron to make the mixture known as “Thermit,” which the •'"Zeppelin bombs were filled with. When heat is applied to the mixture, the aluminium combines fiercely with the oxygen of the iron, and produces a heat so great that heavy steel tramway rails are quickly raised to a temperature at which they may be welded together. —— If we are to make ourselves truly Christian and Catholic in our character, our aims, our principles, then we must be readers of Catholic literature. —John J. Burke, O.S.P.