text: * r ) f 9 \ ssmÆMwtmm 71 WOi r K I -rr —: I w*. :— r . w ■ : ■■■■■ " ""T-v 1 ; T7 - '■ ™ '"n -r v À •I f ■ r-'.'ï ■ \ n -rr —: w*. :— r . w ■ : ■■■■■ " ""T-v 1 ; T7 - '■ ™ '"n -r v f ■ r-'.'ï ■ à $ ■ . - ' A /1 ' ■ :•'■ ' «BraSaiBi" fSîtii -1-*•■*••- :: i i«V : ill * %â?>^ lcÄ£ SPR£?< "' $5! ; g*;f I .• ■ty.M.V ,; **îWm A V ; .». : , Xf > V fâfàtâ —* L?... $ - ♦ • * An Earlier Form of the Shuman-Boys Solar Power Plant, Which More Fully Developed by Prof. Ackermann in Egypt, Produced Sun Power Cheaper Than Coal at $15 Per Ton. Here the Sun's Heat Is Absorbed by Water in the Bottom of the Troughs Which Surround Tubes of Ether. The Pressure of the Ether Thus Vaporized Furnishes the Power. « » ♦ FTER A FTER three-quarters of a century of experiment science has virtual ly solved the problem of harness ini the sun directly to the wheels that do the world's work. As everybody knows, the solar centre of our universe is the Indirect source of all the mechanl eal power developed for man's service. !Wood and coal are products of the sun's action upon the soil. Used as fuel, they {produce steam, and steam drives our •nglnes. In another respect, the sun is an indirect source of our mechanical power, it draws water from the ocean, keeping the rivers flowing, and where there are waterfall powerful wheels are turned without the intervention of steam. So, just as coal is aptly called "bottled sunshine," waterfalls are called "white coal." But coal, in civilized lands at least, is no longer being produced by the sun, and wide cultivation of the soil, thus absorbing most of the annual rainfall, is drying up the streams and more and more limiting the supply of water power. The great coal beds produced by millions of years of sunshine and preserved by geological upheavals are rapidly being exhausted by humanity's voracious demands upon them. The case is the same with the twin sister of coal—petroleum. A few more decades and the supply will be exhausted. In view of these demonstrated facts, Science has pursued the obvious course—proceeded with various plans to induce the sun to give to us day by day the power we need, which formerly it stored in the earth's crust. Steam pressure is still the medium, with the direct action of the sun upon water to convert it into steam. The principle employed is the familiar one of the "burning glass," which produces an intense heat by focusing the sun's rays upon a small point. The theoretically, it is a simple problem in arithmetic to determine what degree of heat will be produced by the concentration of a given area of sunshine upon another smaller area, and how much power should result. Writing on this subject—"The Utilization of Solar Energy—A. S. O. Ackermann, B. Sc., says: "The glowing surface which the sun presents to us, even considering him as a flat duk, has the enormous area of686,760,000,000 square miles, each square foot of which emits the amount of about 12,500 horsepower, and the radiant energy received at the outer surface of the earth's atmosphere is equivalent to 7,300 horsepower per acre. Of this about 70 percent (say 6,000 horsepower per acre) is transmitted to the land surface of the earth at noon on a clear day, and less in the morning and evening, owing to the greater thickness of atmosphere through which the radiation has to pass. "Now, although the theoretical enormous power value of the heat reaching the surface of the earth is no less than 5,000 horsepower per hour, thought that anything like this amount can be converted into mechanical power any more than can all the heat of coal be converted into its theoretical equivalent power. For example, the heat value of good coal is about equal to 12,760 horsepower hours per ton, but in fact the best result, even under test conditions, obtained from a ton of coal by means of a boiler and steam." Engine is only 1,470 acres, It must not be into the engine of mechanical power ever. The First Feeding Bottle. Possibly a hollow gourd constituted the first baby's feeding bottle. Torn from its parent tree, its edible interior would have found its way to the stomach of its adult pluoker, after which the hollow shell would be filled with milk, other liquid refreshment for the satisfaction of the infant. In tropical countries, seal, the coconut would constitute a natural feeding bottle, already filled with the necessary nourishment. Without, however, indulging in speculation of this kind, it may be noted that the archaic vase room at the British Museum contains specimens of feeding bottles—tetina, archaeologists call them—dating back to between six and seven hundred years before Christ. These very early babies' bottles usually globular in shape, are elaborately decorated, and are covered with small knobs which, it is conjectured, were used to hang tiny bells upon. In short, the feeding bottle of those days was also a rattle and a picture book combined. Most Recent Experiments in Running Engines, Heating and Lighting Our Homes and Even Cooking Our Meals. Diagram Showing the Enormous Volume of Solar Radiation Which One Half the Earth's Surface Is Constantly Bathed. Heat —in I brake horsepower hours, or 11.5 percent of the heat value, while in the case of a gas engine the corresponding figure is 25.6 percent, and of a Diesel oil engine 31 percent. "The chief loss is in converting the steam into mechanical energy, and most of the loss is inevitably for thermodynamic reasons. With this fact in mind, you will not be so surprised to learn that the best overall thermal efficiency obtained from the Shuman-Boys plant in Egypt was only 4.32 percent, the chief reasons for this being so much less than 11.5 percent being that the steam pressure was so low, and that the best efficiency of the sun-heat absorber was only 40.1 percent, compared with 75 percent for the best coal-fired boiler. But it has taken boilermakers many years to attain this efficiency, so that 40.1 percent is not a bad result when the number of sun boilers that have been made is taken into account. "It is interesting to realize from the foregoing figures that the value of 2 acres of bright sunshine for an hour is one ton of coal. The demonstration in Egypt, to which Mr. Ackermann refers, was made three years ago at Meadville-on-the-Nile, seven miles South of Cairo. Conditions were peculiarly favorable in this location, as uninterrupted sunlight could be depended upon for many successive days, apparatus represented a refinement and improvement upon several different devices experimented with in this country and Europe since 1837. The earlier reflectors resembled huge inverted lampshades lined with polished metal, or of glass backed with quick silver after the fashion of mirrors in ordinary use. These reflectors were mounted upon a mechanism which caused them to follow the course of the sun." Standing upright in the centre—like the lamp chimney which its shade surrounds—was a water boiler upon which the ways of the sun thus reflected were concentrated. In due time the water boiled, steam was generated and a pressure produced. The value of laughter. The physiological benefits of laughter cannot be overestimated. It shakes up the diaphragm, sets the pulses beating to a lively measure, stimulates the blood, and enlivens the brain. Used with discretion, laughter is as inspiring as a sea breeze, as refreshing as a needed shower. Its moral "Street is beyond computation of unbelief than any other agency. What can be more derisive than a laugh? The man who laughs never kills himself. In some situations laughter is as gracious in its influence as tears. An instance is recalled of a man fated to die of consumption at a sanitarium. Did he sit out on the veranda querulously pouring the tale of his physical and mental woes into the ears of every other victim whom he met? Not a bit of it! He wore the cap and bells of the Jester in order that he might distract the thoughts of his miserable companions from the contemplation of their own sufferings. It has killed more ridiculous situations by its rollicking roars, reduced in the boiler sufficient to run a small engine with a pump, a printing press or some other machines attached to it. The objections to this type of reflector were its great cost on a scale large enough to be useful for power, the difficulty of producing accurate curvature on the surface. A large scale, and the great amount of labor called for in preventing the polished surface from becoming tarnished. The celebrated inventor, John Ericsson, discarded the circular reflector for a long trough with a curved bottom lined with polished metal which reflected the sun's rays upon a cylindrical heater fixed longitudinally just above the trough. By this method there was a distinct gain in the amount of power produced, together with diminution of the cost of the apparatus. The Shuman-Boys invention which has been developed so successfully in Egypt by Mr. Ackermann and his associates is thus described by him in his report to the Smithsonian Institution: "Frank Shuman, of America, started on the problem in 1906, and in 1907 he had a plant running which developed about 3½ horsepower; 1,200 square feet of sunshine fell onto a fixed, horizontal water box with a glass top. In the water there were rows of parallel horizontal black pipes containing ether, and exposing 900 square feet of surface to the solar radiation. The water also became heated and conveyed heat to the under sides of the pipes. The ether boiled, and its steam drove a small vertical, simple, single-cylinder engine. The exhaust ether vapor passed into an air surface condenser, and the liquid ether vapor from this was pumped back into the tubes of the "boiler" already described. "The best run of an hour's duration produced steam at atmospheric pressure at the rate of 7 pounds per 100 square feet of sunshine falling on the box. Toward the end of 1911 the Sun power Company (Eastern Hemisphere), (Ltd.), requested their Consulting engineers Marriage Customs. Many marriage customs observed at the present time are relics of the time when women were «Imply the chattels or slaves of their hus bands. The wedding ring is but a substitute for the chain or fetter, or perhapB the metal badge, of the female «lave of the past. Then there le the custom of throwing an old shoe. In ancient times a ruler would signify his domain over a place by casting his shoe across It. or over a serf by touching the serf's head with hls shoe. The cast ing of a shoe therefore signifies the transfer of authority over the woman to the bridegroom. In the "good old days" a man who wanted a wife sometimes went with a companion to a neighboring tribe and carried a girl off by force. It was then necessary for him to take a hurried Journey to escape the vengeance of the pursuing friends of the girl. So to-day the bride groom has a companion In the shape of his best man. and his honey moon trip commemorates the flight from the wife's friends. Itar Copyrlght, 101«, by tht X ♦ I» ,1 «?; °~\ r • • / A4 V I <^2 r.-fc iM : Kt? m ))* yt. M-l l H ♦ « 9 I 'S. \ 'Æ Mi? ' XX, 0 M Tv.-/ "y ♦ '•'M. *? ■ 0 v o I 0 à A\\ ■ 1 ♦ 0 0 0 <> «> « ü- I* , /l m fartai;' itvuï&aa M 1 *v.. m « I T ❖ ■' r ■fii. ifi '%• - <9 mw** 1 %yjM 0 % mi W V 6 -Hi' Wwlï} * ! « ; 7. Inventor Adams's Family Ate Many Stews and Roasts Cooked by the Heat of Concentrated Sun's Rays Ericsson, for a lined the fixed by gain in together as the sun has about sun water there black radia and the "Sun Glass" Type of Solar Power Plant— Too Expensive for Practical Use. View of a Sun-Power Plant Near Philadelphia Which Demonstrated Its Utility in Pumping Water for Irrigation Purposes. Messrs. A. S. E. Ackermann and C. T. Walrond) to select and invite some distinguished physicist to join them in a conservative capacity. Hence Professor O. V. Boys, F. R. S., became associated with the work, and he suggested a vital change in the design of the absorber, viz., that the boilers should be placed on edge in a channel-shaped reflector of parabolic cross section, so that solar radiation was received on both their surfaces, instead of one being worse than idle, as it was when the boilers were placed side on to the sun. "An absorber of this design was constructed and erected at Mead on the Nile, seven miles south of Cairo, in 1912, but the boiler was constructed of thin steel. Great Britain Rights Reserved... A new type of boiler was replaced by a cast-iron one in 1913. In addition to the alteration of the shape of the reflectors, another very important change was made. Their axes were placed north and south, and they were automatically heeled over from an eastern aspect in the morning to a western one in the evening, so as to follow the sun. Thus the same number of solar rays were caught all day long, and the small decrease in steam production in the morning and evening was almost entirely due to the greater thickness of atmosphere through which the rays had to pass. The total area of sunshine collected was 13,269 square feet. The Adams Solar Cooker in Which Pans of Glass Surrounding" Boiler Concentrate the Sun's Heat Upon It "The boilers were placed at the foot of the reflectors and were covered with a single layer of glass enclosing an air space around the boilers. Each channel shaped reflector and its boiler was 205 feet long, and there were five such sections placed side by side. "The maximum quantity of steam produced was twelve pounds per 100 square feet of sunshine, equivalent to 183 square feet per brake horsepower, and the maximum thermal efficiency was 40.1 percent. The best hour's run gave 1,442 pounds of steam at atmospheric pressure, hence, allowing the twenty-two pounds of steam per brake horsepower, the maximum output for an hour was 66.5 brake horsepower—a result about ten times as large as anything previously attained, and equal to sixty-three brake horsepower per acre of land occupied by the plant." Mr. Ackermann's conclusion is that the problem of harnessing the sun and making it run our machinery is solved in all localities where there is plenty of sunshine and the price of coal is more than $15 per ton. He remarks that where coal is dear sunshine is often plentiful, and that sun-power plants are admirably suited for pumping in connection with irrigation—for where there is most sunshine there is the greatest need for irrigation. Patrick and the Jury. A famous lawyer had a client named Murphy who had been arrested for illegal sale of liquor. The police had no evidence but one pint of whiskey, which they found in his house. In court this evidence was produced, and a somewhat vivid claim of prima facie evidence of guilt was made by the prosecuting attorney. During all this counsel for the prisoner was silent. When his turn came for the defense he rose and said, "Patrick Murphy, stand up." Murphy, with a big red nose, unshaven face, bleared eyes and a general appearance of dil. apidation, rose. "Patrick Murphy, look upon the Jury; : entlemen of the Ju /, look on Patrick Murphy.'* Jury and prisoner mutually com* plied. v The counsel gated at And Patrick for % moment, then solemnly turned to tho Jury "Do you mean to say to this court and me you honorabyy and tru? lieve that Patrick Murphy, if he had u pint of whiskey, would sell it?** Murphy* waa acquitted. be-. 