[Illustration: Pl. XIII. AMERICAN HIGH-PRESSURE ENGINE]
THE STEAM ENGINE
FAMILIARLY EXPLAINED AND ILLUSTRATED;
WITH
AN HISTORICAL SKETCH OF ITS INVENTION AND
PROGRESSIVE IMPROVEMENT;
ITS APPLICATIONS TO
NAVIGATION AND RAILWAYS;
WITH
PLAIN MAXIMS FOR RAILWAY SPECULATORS.
BY THE
REV. DIONYSIUS LARDNER, LL. D., F. R. S.,
FELLOW OF THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF EDINBURGH; OF THE ROYAL IRISH ACADEMY;
OF THE ROYAL ASTRONOMICAL SOCIETY; OF THE CAMBRIDGE
PHILOSOPHICAL SOCIETY; OF THE STATISTICAL SOCIETY OF PARIS; OF THE
LINNÆAN AND ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETIES; OF THE SOCIETY FOR
PROMOTING USEFUL ARTS IN SCOTLAND, ETC.
WITH ADDITIONS AND NOTES,
BY JAMES RENWICK, LL. D.,
PROFESSOR OF NATURAL EXPERIMENTAL PHILOSOPHY AND CHEMISTRY
IN COLUMBIA COLLEGE, NEW YORK.
ILLUSTRATED BY ENGRAVINGS AND WOODCUTS.
SECOND AMERICAN, FROM THE FIFTH LONDON, EDITION,
CONSIDERABLY ENLARGED.
PHILADELPHIA:
E. L. CAREY & A. HART.
1836
Entered, according to the Act of Congress, in the year 1836, by E. L.
CAREY & A. HART, in the Clerk's office of the District Court for the
Eastern District of Pennsylvania.
PREFACE
OF
THE AMERICAN EDITOR.
Several of the additions, which were made by the Editor to the first
American edition, have been superseded by the great extension, which
the original has from time to time received from its author. This is
more particularly the case, with the sections which had reference to
the character of steam at temperatures other than that of boiling
water, to the use of steam in navigation, and to its application to
locomotion. These sections have of course been omitted. A few new
sections, and several notes have been added, illustrative of such
points as may be most interesting to the American reader.
COLUMBIA COLLEGE,
_New York, March, 1836_.
PREFACE
TO
THE FIFTH EDITION.
This volume should more properly be called a new work than a new
edition of the former one. In fact the book has been almost rewritten.
The change which has taken place, even in the short period which has
elapsed since the publication of the first edition, in the relation of
the steam engine to the useful arts, has been so considerable as to
render this inevitable.
The great extension of railroads, and the increasing number of
projects which have been brought forward for new lines connecting
various points of the kingdom, as well as the extension of steam
navigation, not only through the seas and channels surrounding and
intersecting these islands, and throughout other parts of Europe, but
through the larger waters which are interposed between our dominions
in the East and the countries of Egypt and Syria, have conferred so
much interest on the application of steam to transport, that I have
thought it adviseable to extend the limits of the present edition
considerably beyond those of the last. The chapter on railroads has
been enlarged and improved. Three chapters have been added. The
twelfth chapter contains a view of steam navigation; the thirteenth
contains several important points connected with the economy of steam
power, which, when this work was first published, would not have
offered sufficient interest to justify their admission into a popular
treatise; and the fourteenth chapter contains a series of compendious
maxims, for the instruction and guidance of persons desirous of making
investments or speculating in railway property.
_London, December, 1835._
PREFACE
TO
THE FIRST EDITION.
There are two classes of persons whose attention may be attracted by a
treatise on such a subject as the Steam Engine. One consists of those
who, by trade or profession, are interested in mechanical science, and
who therefore seek information on the subject of which it treats, as a
matter of necessity, and a wish to acquire it in a manner and to an
extent which may be practically available in their avocations. The
other and more numerous class is that part of the public in general,
who, impelled by choice rather than necessity, think the interest of
the subject itself, and the pleasure derivable from the instances of
ingenuity which it unfolds, motives sufficiently strong to induce them
to undertake the study of it. Without leaving the former class
altogether out of view, it is for the use of the latter principally
that the following lectures are designed.
To this class of readers the Steam Engine is a subject which, if
properly treated of, must present strong and peculiar attractions.
Whether we consider the history of its invention as to time and place,
the effects which it has produced, or the means by which it has caused
these effects, we find everything to gratify our national pride,
stimulate our curiosity, excite our wonder, and command our
admiration. The invention and progressive improvement of this
extraordinary machine, is the work of our own time and our own
country; it has been produced and brought to perfection almost within
the last century, and is the exclusive offspring of British genius
fostered and supported by British capital. To enumerate the effects of
this invention, would be to count every comfort and luxury of life. It
has increased the sum of human happiness, not only by calling new
pleasures into existence, but by so cheapening former enjoyments as to
render them attainable by those who before never could have hoped to
share them. Nor are its effects confined to England alone: they extend
over the whole civilized world; and the savage tribes of America,
Asia, and Africa, must ere long feel the benefits, remote or
immediate, of this all-powerful agent.
If the effect which this machine has had on commerce and the wealth of
nations raise our astonishment, the means by which this effect has
been produced will not less excite our admiration. The history of the
Steam Engine presents a series of contrivances, which, for exquisite
and refined ingenuity, stand without a parallel in the annals of human
invention. These admirable contrivances, unlike other results of
scientific investigation, have also this peculiarity, that to
understand and appreciate their excellence requires little previous
or subsidiary knowledge. A simple and clear explanation, divested as
far as possible of technicalities, and assisted by well selected
diagrams, is all that is necessary to render the principles of the
construction and operation of the Steam Engine intelligible to a
person of plain understanding and moderate information.
The purpose for which this volume is designed, as already explained,
has rendered necessary the omission of many particulars which, however
interesting and instructive to the practical mechanic or professional
engineer, would have little attraction for the general reader. Our
readers require to be informed of the general principles of the
construction and operation of Steam Engines, rather than of their
practical details. For the same reasons we have confined ourselves to
the more striking and important circumstances in the history of the
invention and progressive improvement of this machine, excluding many
petty disputes which arose from time to time respecting the rights of
invention, the interest of which is buried in the graves of their
respective claimants.
In the descriptive parts of the work we have been governed by the same
considerations. The application of the force of steam to mechanical
purposes has been proposed on various occasions, in various countries,
and under a great variety of forms. The list of British patents alone
would furnish an author of common industry and application with matter
to swell his book to many times the bulk of this volume. By far the
greater number of these projects have, however, proved abortive.
Descriptions of such unsuccessful, though frequently ingenious
machines, we have thought it adviseable to exclude from our pages, as
not possessing sufficient interest for the readers to whose use this
volume is dedicated. We have therefore strictly confined our
descriptions either to those Steam Engines which have come into
general use, or to those which form an important link in the chain of
invention.
_December 26, 1827._
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I.
PRELIMINARY MATTER.
Motion the Agent in Manufactures. -- Animal Power. -- Power
depending on physical Phenomena. -- Purpose of a Machine. --
Prime Mover. -- Mechanical qualities of the Atmosphere. -- Its
Weight. -- The Barometer. -- Fluid Pressure. -- Pressure of
rarefied Air. -- Elasticity of Air. -- Bellows. -- Effects of
Heat. -- Thermometer. -- Method of making one. -- Freezing and
Boiling Points. -- Degrees. -- Dilatation of bodies. --
Liquefaction and Solidification. -- Vaporisation and
Condensation. -- Latent Heat of Steam. -- Expansion of Water in
Evaporating. -- Effects of Repulsion and Cohesion. -- Effect of
Pressure upon Boiling Point. -- Formation of a Vacuum by
Condensation. Page 17