作者：Various
格式: AZW3, DOCX, EPUB, MOBI, PDF, TXT
Scientific American Supplement, No. 441, June 14, 1884试读：
FAURE'S MACHINE FOR DECORTICATING SUGAR-CANE.
The object of the apparatus shown in the accompanying engraving is to effect a separation of the tough epidermis of the sugar-cane from the internal spongy pith which is to be pressed. Its function consists in isolating and separating the cells from their cortex, and in putting them in direct contact with the rollers or cylinders of the mill. After their passage into the apparatus, which is naturally placed in a line with the endless chain that carries them to the mill, the canes arrive in less compact layers, pass through much narrower spaces, and finally undergo a more efficient pressure, which is shown by an abundant flow of juice. The first trials of the machine were made in 1879 at the Pointe Simon Works, at Martinique, with the small type that was shown at the Paris Exhibition of 1878. These experiments, which were applied to a work of 3,000 kilos of cane per hour, gave entire satisfaction, and decided the owners of three of the colonial works (Pointe Simon, Larcinty, and Marin) to adopt it for the season of 1880.
The apparatus is shown in longitudinal section in Fig. 1, and in plan in Fig. 2.
Fig. 3 gives a transverse section passing through the line 3-4, and Fig. 4 an external view on the side whence the decorticated canes make their exit from the apparatus.FAURE'S MACHINE FOR DECORTICATING SUGAR CANE.
The other figures relate to details that will be referred to further along.
The Decorticating Cylinder.—The principal part of the apparatus is a hollow drum, A, of cast iron, 430 mm. in internal diameter by 1.41 m. in length, which is keyed at its two extremities to the shaft, a. Externally, this drum (which is represented apart in transverse section in Fig. 5) has the form of an octagonal prism with well dressed projections between which are fixed the eight plates, C, that constitute the decorticating cylinder. These plates, which are of tempered cast iron, and one of which is shown in transverse section in Fig. 7, when once in place form a cylindrical surface provided with 48 helicoidal, dentate channels. The length of these plates is 470 mm. There are three of them in the direction of the generatrices of the cylinder, and this makes a total of 24. All are strengthened by ribs (as shown in Fig. 8), and each is fixed by 4 bolts, c, 20mm. in diameter. The pitch of the helices of each tooth is very elongated, and reaches about 7.52 m. The depth of the toothing is 18 mm.
Frame and Endless Chain.—The cylinder thus constructed rotates with a velocity of 50 revolutions per minute over a cylindrical vessel, B', cast in a piece with the frame, B. This vessel is lined with two series of tempered cast iron plates, D and D', called exit and entrance plates, which rest thereon, through the intermedium of well dressed pedicels, and which are held in place by six 20-millimeter bolts. Their length is 708 mm. The entrance plates, D, are provided with 6 spiral channels, whose pitch is equal to that of the channels of the decorticating cylinder, C, and in the same direction. The depth of the toothing is 10 mm.
The exit plates, D', are provided with 7 spiral channels of the same pitch and direction as those of the preceding, but the depth of which increases from 2 to 10 mm. The axis of the decorticating cylinder does not coincide with that of the vessel, B', so that the free interval for the passage of the cane continues to diminish from the entrance to the exit.
The passage of the cane to the decorticator gives rise to a small quantity of juice, which flows through two orifices, b', into a sort of cast iron trough, G, suspended beneath the vessel. The cane, which is brought to the apparatus by an endless belt, empties in a conduit formed of an inclined bottom, E, of plate iron, and two cast iron sides provided with ribs. These sides rest upon the two ends of the vessel, B', and are cross-braced by two flat bars, e, to which is bolted the bottom, E. This conduit is prolonged beyond the decorticating cylinder by an inclined chute, F, the bottom of which is made of plate iron 7 mm. thick and the sides of the same material 9 mm. thick. The hollow frame, B, whose general form is like that of a saddle, carries the bearings, b, in which revolves the shaft, a. One of these bearings is represented in detail in Figs. 9 and 10. It will be seen that the cap is held by bolts with sunken heads, and that the bearing on the bushes is through horizontal surfaces only. In a piece with this frame are cast two similar brackets, B², which support the axle, h, of the endless chain. To this axle, whose diameter is 100 mm., are keyed, toward the extremities, the pinions, H, to which correspond the endless pitch chains, i. These latter are formed, as may be seen in Figs. 11 and 12, of two series of links. The shorter of these latter are only 100 mm. in length, while the longer are 210 mm., and are hollowed out so as to receive the butts of the boards, I. The chain thus formed passes over two pitch pinions, J, like the pinions, H, that are mounted at the extremities of an axle, j, that revolves in bearings, I', whose position with regard to the apparatus is capable of being varied so as to slacken or tauten the chain, I. This arrangement is shown in elevation in Fig. 13.
Transmission.—The driving shaft, k, revolves in a pillow block, K, cast in a piece with the frame, B. It is usually actuated by a special motor, and carries a fly-wheel (not shown in the figure for want of space). It receives in addition a cog-wheel, L, which transmits its motion to the decorticating cylinder through, the intermedium of a large wooden-toothed gear wheel, L'. The shaft, a, whose diameter is 228 mm., actuates in its turn, through the pinions, M' and M, the pitch pinion, N, upon whose prolonged hub is keyed the pinion, M. This latter is mounted loosely upon the intermediate axle, m. Motion is transmitted to the driving shaft, h, of the endless chain, I, by an ordinary pitch chain, through a gearing which is shown in Fig. 12. The pitch pinion, N', is cast in a piece with a hollow friction cone, N², which is mounted loosely upon the shaft, h, and to which corresponds a second friction cone, O. This latter is connected by a key to a socket, o, upon which it slides, and which is itself keyed to the shaft, h. The hub of the cone, O, is connected by a ring with a bronze nut, p, mounted at the threaded end of the shaft, h, and carrying a hand-wheel, P. It is only necessary to turn this latter in one direction or the other in order to throw the two cones into or out of gear.
If we allow that the motor has a velocity of 70 revolutions per minute, the decorticating cylinder will run at the rate of 50, and the sugar-cane will move forward at the rate of 12 meters per minute.
This new machine is a very simple and powerful one. The decortication is effected with wonderful rapidity, and the canes, opened throughout their entire length and at all points of their circumference, leave the apparatus in a state that allows of no doubt as to what the result of the pressure will be that they have to undergo. There is no tearing, no trituration, no loss of juice, but merely a simple preparation for a rational pressure effected under most favorable conditions.
The apparatus, which is made in several sizes, has already received numerous applications in Martinique, Trinidad, Cuba, Antigua, St. Domingo, Peru, Australia, the Mauritius Islands, and Brazil.—Publication Industrielle.MOVING A BRIDGE.
An interesting piece of engineering work has recently been accomplished at Bristol, England, which consisted in the moving of a foot-bridge 134 feet in length, bodily, down the river a considerable distance. The pontoons by means of which the bridge was floated to its new position consisted of four 80-ton barges, braced together so as to form one solid structure 64 feet in width, and were placed in position soon after the tide commenced to rise. At six o'clock A.M. the top of the stages, which was 24 feet above the water, touched the under part of the bridge, and in a quarter of an hour later both ends rose from their foundations. When the tide had risen 4 ft. the stage and bridge were floated to the new position, when at 8.30 the girders dropped on to their beds.THE GENERATION OF STEAM, AND THE THERMODYNAMIC PROBLEMS 1INVOLVED.By Mr. WILLIAM ANDERSON, M.I.C.E.
It will not be necessary to commence this lecture by explaining the origin of fuel; it will be sufficient if I remind you that it is to the action of the complex rays of the sun upon the foliage of plants that we mainly owe our supply of combustibles. The tree trunks and branches of our forests, as well as the subterranean deposits of coal and naphtha, at one time formed portions of the atmosphere in the form of carbonic acid gas; that gas was decomposed by the energy of the solar rays, the carbon and the oxygen were placed in positions of advantage with respect to each other—endowed with potential energy; and it is my duty this evening to show how we can best make use of these relations, and by once more combining the constituents of fuel with the oxygen of the air, reverse the action which caused the growth of the plants, that is to say, by destroying the plant reproduce the heat and light which fostered it. The energy which can be set free by this process cannot be greater than that derived originally from the sun, and which, acting through the frail mechanism of green leaves, tore asunder the strong bonds of chemical affinity wherein the carbon and oxygen were hound, converting the former into the ligneous portions of the plants and setting the latter free for other uses. The power thus silently exerted is enormous; for every ton of carbon separated in twelve hours necessitates an expenditure of energy represented by at least 1,058 horse power, but the action is spread over an enormous area of leaf surface, rendered necessary by the small proportion of carbonic acid contained in the air, by measure only 1/2000 part, and hence the action is silent and imperceptible. It is now conceded on all hands that what is termed heat is the energy of molecular motion, and that this motion is convertible into various kinds and obeys the general laws relating to motion. Two substances brought within the range of chemical affinity unite with more or less violence; the motion of transition of the particles is transformed, wholly or in part, into a vibratory or rotary motion, either of the particles themselves or the interatomic ether; and according to the quality of the motions we are as a rule, besides other effects, made conscious of heat or light, or of both. When these emanations come to be examined they are found to be complex in the extreme, intimately bound up together, and yet capable of being separated and analyzed.
As soon as the law of definite chemical combination was firmly established, the circumstance that changes of temperature accompanied most chemical combinations was noticed, and chemists were not long in suspecting that the amount of heat developed or absorbed by chemical reaction should be as much a property of the substances entering into combination as their atomic weights. Solid ground for this expectation lies in the dynamic theory of heat. A body of water at a given height is competent by its fall to produce a definite and invariable quantity of heat or work, and in the same way two substances falling together in chemical union acquire a definite amount of kinetic energy, which, if not expended in the work of molecular changes, may also by suitable arrangements be made to manifest a definite and invariable quantity of heat.
At the end of last century Lavoisier and Laplace, and after them, down to our own time, Dulong, Desprez, Favre and Silbermann, Andrews, Berthelot, Thomson, and others, devoted much time and labor to the experimental determination of the heat of combustion and the laws which governed its development. Messrs. Favre and Silbermann, in particular, between the years 1845 and 1852, carried out a splendid series of experiments by means of the apparatus partly represented in Fig. 1 (opposite), which is a drawing one-third the natural size of the calorimeter employed. It consisted essentially of a combustion chamber formed of thin copper, gilt internally. The upper part of the chamber was fitted with a cover through which the combustible could be introduced, with a pipe for a gas jet, with a peep hole closed by adiathermanous but transparent substances, alum and glass, and with a branch leading to a thin copper coil surrounding the lower part of the chamber and descending below it. The whole of this portion of the apparatus was plunged into a thin copper vessel, silvered internally and filled with water, which was kept thoroughly mixed by means of agitators. This second vessel stood inside a third one, the sides and bottom of which were covered with the skins of swans with the down on, and the whole was immersed in a fourth vessel tilled with water, kept at the average temperature of the laboratory. Suitable thermometers of great delicacy were provided, and all manner of precautions were taken to prevent loss of heat.THE GENERATION OF STEAM. Fig 1.
It is impossible not to admire the ingenuity and skill exhibited in the details of the apparatus, in the various accessories for generating and storing the gases used, and for absorbing and weighing the products of combustion; but it is a matter of regret that the experiments should have been carried out on so small a scale. For example, the little cage which held the solid fuel tested was only 5/8 inch diameter by barely 2 inches high, and held only 38 grains of charcoal, the combustion occupying about sixteen minutes. Favre and Silbermann adopted the plan of ascertaining the weight of the substances consumed by calculation from the weight of the products of combustion. Carbonic acid was absorbed by caustic potash, as also was carbonic oxide, after having been oxidized to carbonic acid by heated oxide of copper, and the vapor of water was absorbed by concentrated sulphuric acid. The adoption of this system showed that it was in any case necessary to analyze the products of combustion in order to,m detect imperfect action. Thus, in the case of substances containing carbon, carbonic oxide was always present to a variable extent with the carbonic acid, and corrections were necessary in order to determine the total heat due to the complete combination of the substance with oxygen. Another advantage gained was that the absorption of the products of combustion prevents any sensible alteration in the volumes during the process, so that corrections for the heat absorbed in the work of displacing the atmosphere were not required. The experiments on various substances were repeated many times. The mean results for those in which we are immediately interested are given in Table I., next column.
Comparison with later determinations have established their substantial accuracy. The general conclusion arrived at is thus stated:
"As a rule there is an equality between the heat disengaged or absorbed in the acts, respectively, of chemical combination or decomposition of the same elements, so that the heat evolved during the combination of two simple or com-pound substances is equal to the heat absorbed at the time of their chemical segregation."TABLE I.—SUBSTANCES ENTERING INTO THE COMPOSITION OF FUEL.Symbol and Heat evolved inAtomic Weight.the Combustion of1 lb. of Fuel.Before After In BritishIn PoundsCombusCombusThermalof WatertiontionUnits.Evaporatedfrom andat 212°.Hydrogen H2burned in 62,032H11864.21Ooxygen.Carbon burned to 4,451C12CO284.61carbonic oxide.Carbon CO14,544burned to C124415.062carbonic acid.Carbonic oxide burned CO4,326CO28444.482to carbonic acid.HOlefiant gas C22C(ethylene) 41221,3432822.09burnt in O2H422oxygen.O2CMarsh gas O(methane) 2CH23,513168024.344burnt in 2H2oxygen.O
Composition of air— + 0.014 HO{by volume 0.788 N + 0.197 O + 0.001 CO22 + 0.017 HOby weight 0.771 N + 0.218 O + 0.009 CO22
This law is, however, subject to some apparent exceptions. Carbon burned in protoxide of nitrogen, or laughing gas, NO, 2produces about 38 per cent. more heat than the same substance burned in pure oxygen, notwithstanding that the work of decomposing the protoxide of nitrogen has to be performed. In marsh gas, or methane, CH, again, the energy of combustion is considerably less 4than that due to the burning of its carbon and hydrogen separately. These exceptions probably arise from the circumstance that the energy of chemical action is absorbed to a greater or less degree in effecting molecular changes, as, for example, the combustion of 1 pound of nitrogen to form protoxide of nitrogen results in the absorption of 1,157 units of heat. Berthelot states, as one of the fundamental principles of thermochemistry, "that the quantity of heat evolved is the measure of the sum of the chemical and physical work accomplished in the reaction"; and such a law will no doubt account for the phenomena above noted. The equivalent heat of combustion of the compounds we have practically to deal with has been experimentally determined, and therefore constitutes a secure basis on which to establish calculations of the caloric value of fuel; and in doing so, with respect to substances composed of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen, it is convenient to reduce the hydrogen to its heat-producing equivalent of carbon. The heat of combustion of hydrogen being 62,032 units, that of carbon 14,544 units, it follows that 4.265 times the weight of hydrogen will represent an equivalent amount of carbon. With respect to the oxygen, it is found that it exists in combination with the hydrogen in the form of water, and, being combined already, abstracts its combining equivalent of hydrogen from the efficient ingredients of the fuel; and hence hydrogen, to the extent of 1/8 of the weight of the oxygen, must be deducted. The general formula then becomes:
Heat of combustion = 14,544 {C + 4.265 (H-(O/8))},
and water evaporated from and at 212°, taking 966 units as the heat necessary to evaporate 1 pound of water,
lb. evaporated = 15.06 {C + 4.265 (H-(O/8))},
carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen being taken at their weight per cent. in the fuel. Strictly speaking, marsh gas should be separately determined. It often happens that available energy is not in a form in which it can be applied directly to our needs. The water flowing down from the mountains in the neighborhood of the Alpine tunnels was competent to provide the power necessary for boring through them, but it was not in a form in which it could be directly applied. The kinetic energy of the water had first to be changed into the potential energy of air under pressure, then, in that form, by suitable mechanism, it was used with signal success to disintegrate and excavate the hard rock of the tunnels. The energy resulting from combustion is also incapable of being directly transformed into useful motive power; it must first be converted into potential force of steam or air at high temperature and pressure, and then applied by means of suitable heat engines to produce the motions we require. It is probably to this circumstance that we must attribute the slowness of the human race to take advantage of the energy of combustion. The history of the steam engine hardly dates back 200 years, a very small fraction of the centuries during which man has existed, even since historic times.
The apparatus by means of which the potential energy of fuel with respect to oxygen is converted into the potential energy of steam, we call a steam boiler; and although it has neither cylinder nor piston, crank nor fly wheel, I claim for it that it is a veritable heat engine, because it transmits the undulations and vibrations caused by the energy of chemical combination in the fuel to the water in the boiler; these motions expend themselves in overcoming the liquid cohesion of the water and imparting to its molecules that vigor of motion which converts them into the molecules of a gas which, impinging on the surfaces which confine it and form the steam space, declare their presence and energy in the shape of pressure and temperature. A steam pumping engine, which furnishes water under high pressure to raise loads by means of hydraulic cranes, is not more truly a heat engine than a simple boiler, for the latter converts the latent energy of fuel into the latent energy of steam, just as the pumping engine converts the latent energy of steam into the latent energy of the pumped-up accumulator or the hoisted weight.
If I am justified in taking this view, then I am justified in applying to my heat engine the general principles laid down in 1824 by Sadi Carnot, namely, that the proportion of work which can be obtained out of any substance working between two temperatures depends entirely and solely upon the difference between the temperatures at the beginning and end of the operation; that is to say, if T be the higher temperature at the beginning, and t the lower temperature at the end of the action, then the maximum possible work to be got out of the substance will be a function of (T-t). The greatest range of temperature possible or conceivable is from the absolute temperature of the substance at the commencement of the operation down to absolute zero of temperature, and the fraction of this which can be utilized is the ratio which the range of temperature through which the substance is working bears to the absolute temperature at the commencement of the action. If W = the greatest amount of effect to be expected, T and t the absolute temperatures, and H the total quantity of heat (expressed in foot pounds or in water evaporated, as the case may be) potential in the substance at the higher temperature, T, at the beginning of the operation, then Carnot's law is expressed by the equation:T - tW = H ()T
I will illustrate this important doctrine in the manner which Carnot
试读结束[说明：试读内容隐藏了图片]