THE AUSTRIAN government has ordered thirty-seven engines arranged to
burn kerosene, for use in the Arlberg tunnel, in which lack of proper
ventilation at present causes the tunnel to remain filled with
smoke.--Uhland's Wochenschrift.
One of the first essentials to modern military enterprise is the
establishment of a military railway system for war purposes. To be in
a position to carry out efficiently and speedily what we may expect to
be called upon to do on the outbreak of serious war, previous
preparation in time of peace is an absolute requisite. In connection
with General Sherman's operations in Georgia, during the American
civil war, an army was supplied for six and a half months over a line
473 miles long. The corps of workmen was 10,000 strong, and on one
occasion replaced 35,000 sleepers and nine miles of rails in seven
days. The true defense of the line was effected by the engineers
always having men and material ready. In spite of the large and
skilled railway population on which the army could call, and of the
fact that practically the nation was in arms, it was found extremely
difficult to keep this railway construction corps together until they
were placed under a severe military discipline.--United Service
Gazette.
A HOSPITAL car has been introduced on the Belgian railroads, says
The Engineer. It is designed for use in the event of a serious railway
accident, and can be run to the spot where the wounded may be picked
up and carried to the nearest city for treatment, instead of being
left to pass hours in some wayside station while awaiting surgical
attendance. The interior of this car is divided into a main
compartment, a corridor on one side and two small rooms at the end.
The largest compartment, the hospital proper, contains twenty-four
isolated beds on steel tubes hung upon powerful springs; each bed is
provided with a small movable table, a cord serving to hold all the
various small objects which may be needed, and each patient lies in
front of two little windows, which may be closed or opened at will.
The corridor on the outside of the hospital chamber leads to the linen
closet and the doctor's apartment; in the latter is a large cupboard,
the upper portion being used for drugs, while the lower is divided
into two sections, one serving as a case for surgical instruments and
the other as a receptacle for the doctor's folding bed.
THE DUST collected from the smoke of some Liege furnaces, burning
coal raised from the neighboring mines, produces, when dissolved in
hydrochloric acid, a solution from which considerable quantities of
arsenic and several other metallic salts may be precipitated.
Commenting on this fact, ascertained by M.A. Jorissen, M. Francis Maur
asks whether this breathing of arsenic and other minerals in a finely
divided state may not account for the singular immunity from epidemics
enjoyed by certain industrial districts, such as that of Saint
Etienne, and hopes that some mine doctor will throw additional light
on the subject. In the meanwhile, it may be suggested that the
ventilating effect of the numerous chimneys in iron making and other
industrial centers has its due share in constantly driving off the
vitiated air and replacing it by fresh quantities of pure air. At any
rate, when pestilence was raging in the high and pleasant quarter of
Clifton, its inhabitants migrated to the low-lying and not overclean
parish of St. Philips, Bristol, where the air is black from the smoke
of numerous chimneys, but where also the mortality compared very
favorably with that in the fashionable quarter.
A TWO-SPEED movable sidewalk, of the Blot, Guyenet and De Mocomble
type, is to be used for conveying visitors at the Paris Exposition,
says Engineering News. It differs from those of Chicago and Berlin in
the reduction of the weight of the moving platform by spacing the
driving wheels 127.5 feet apart and using electricity as a motive
power. The driving wheels are mounted in the bed of the track and
impart motion to a central rail on the under side of the platform.
Bearing wheels, spaced about 20 feet apart under this rail, also carry
the platform, and the central rail supports one-half the total weight
of the platform; small side wheels carry the other half on side
tracks. This arrangement enables the platform, which is divided into
sections and hinged, to pass around quite sharp curves. The high speed
platform, 4 feet 3 inches wide, is supposed to move at the rate of
6½ miles per hour on a 35½-inch gage track; the slow platform is
31½ inches wide, moves at half speed and runs on a 17-3/4-inch gage
track. The whole structure will be elevated on girders carried by cast
iron columns, with stations about 656 feet apart. The high speed
platform weighs 146 pounds per lineal foot; and with passengers,
nearly 400 pounds per foot. The slow speed platform weighs about half
this. The track will be about 2½ miles long; the initial motive
power is figured at 472 H.P. and the carrying capacity at 38,880 per
hour.
THE "SCHLAMM," or mud, thrown down from the water of coal washing
has hitherto been regarded as worthless, says The Engineering and
Mining Journal, except that sometimes a portion of the coal particles
it contained have been separated and made of value by a washing
process; but Bergassessor Haarmann, of Friedrichsthal, has invented a
new method for treating it dry and dividing it into two products, one
of which, with low ash content, is distinguished by its granular
nature, while the other contains a large proportion of ash and is of
the fineness of flour. The former of these two products is, on account
of its low ash content, useful for various purposes, and the latter
constitutes a fuel quite ready for use in coal dust firing. The method
is founded on the circumstances, hitherto lost sight of, that the
incombustible constituents of the "schlamm" chiefly consist of clay
which was formerly more or less dissolved in the wash water; and on
the mud being dried and subjected to a suitable mechanical process,
the clay falls into fine dust, while the coal particles, on the
contrary, retain their granular nature. The method is carried out by
drying the mud and a subsequent fine sifting, which effects a breaking
up of the lumps that occur in the dried "schlamm," and a separation
into the two products above named. The dust that falls through the
sieve has a high ash content, being in the nature of flour, while what
remains behind is granular and has a low ash content. It seems to us
that this game is hardly worth the candle.
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