Читать книгу Locomotive Engine Running and Management онлайн

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If an accomplished scientist were to ride on the engine, observing the operations of a first-class fireman, he would find that nearly all the carbon of the coal combined with its natural quantity of oxygen to produce carbon dioxide, thereby giving forth its greatest heat-power; and that the hydro-carbons, the volatile gases of the coal, performed their share of calorific duty by burning with an intensely hot flame. He would find that these hydro-carbon gases, although productive of high-power duty when properly consumed, were ticklish to manage just right, for they would pass through the flues without producing flame if they were not fully supplied with air; and, if the supply of air were too liberal, it would reduce the temperature of the fire-box below the igniting-point for these gases, which is higher than red-hot iron, and they would then escape in the form of worthless smoke. Our model fireman manages to consume these gases as thoroughly as they can be consumed in a locomotive fire-box.