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For the small home or apartment, a metal cabinet has been devised to inclose the gas cookstove, shielding the rest of the room from odors, excess heat and smoke, and adding to the appearance of the cooking quarters. The doors have louvers at the base to admit cool air from close to the floor. This sweeps up through the cabinet and out into a chimney duct at the top.

 

The use of burned shale or clay in place of sand and stone in concrete, for buildings and bridges, has resulted in a lighter material without a sacrifice of strength, engineers declare. Ordinary concrete weighs about 145 pounds to the cubic foot, but the shale mixture only ninety-five pounds. The material is about the same as that employed in the manufacture of brick. It is heated to a high temperature until it becomes plastic, this process expanding the mass and causing a large number of small pockets or air cells to form, owing to the escape of gas. This light stuff is then crushed and used instead of sand for mixing with the cement. Its aid in building was illustrated recently in Kansas City, where six stories were added to a structure originally intended for but four more. Use of the lighter cement enabled the engineers to erect two extra stories without hazard.

 

Wooden furniture absorbs moisture, consequently, in moist seasons, is heavier, as a general rule, than it is in winter when the house is heated. A bureau, weighing 200 pounds, may be twenty-four pounds heavier under average summer humidity as compared to its normal weight when the furnace is going and the air in the rooms is drier. These changes occur in spite of paints, enamels and other finishes, tests by the United States forest service have shown. The coatings are none the less useful, for they prevent sudden checking and swelling that would result were the wood not so protected.

 

In place of springs, sponge rubber is being used for upholstering automobile seats and other articles. The material is said to hold its shape, give the covering longer wear and to be more comfortable than other kinds. It is strong and easily shaped to give uniform resiliency.

{{c|{{smaller|Rubber Upholstering for Chair Bottom: Its Soft, Spongy Texture Is Revealed When It Is Squeezed}}

