Читать книгу Description of the Process of Manufacturing Coal Gas. For the Lighting of Streets Houses, and Public Buildings онлайн

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The proper mode of constructing the retorts in which the coal is distilled, and the art of applying them form an object of primary importance in every gas-light establishment. According as the manufacture is conducted in these respects with a due regard to physical principles, depends the quantity of gas which can be obtained in any given time, from any given quantity of coal, the consumption of fuel requisite for the production of that quantity of gas, the degree of deterioration to which the distillatory vessel is subjected, the quality in some measure, of the gas itself; and, as the ultimate result of all these circumstances, the cheapness at which the gas light can be furnished to the consumer.

The essential influence of these various particulars on the value of the art of lighting with coal gas, has led to much assiduous enquiry to ascertain that sort of construction and mode of operation in respect to each of them which may be most advantageous. And in no branch of the new art of procuring light, has a greater variety of plans of improvement been submitted to the several directing boards of gas works, or more labour and expence been incurred in experiments conducted on a large scale, to ascertain the relative merits of these plans. Nor is there any part of the gas-light process in which a greater number of material alterations have been put in practice.