Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 55.djvu/357

Rh to the consumer through mains like ordinary illuminating gas; or it may be liquefied at a gas works and delivered to the consumer in the liquid form under pressure; or the consumer may purchase carbide and generate acetylene for his own consumption. All three of these methods are in use.

To understand the attitude of insurance companies and of consumers toward liquid acetylene it will be well to examine its record for the last few years. Those interested in methods for liquefying acetylene, and for reducing the pressure of the liquid at the place of consumption so that the consumer actually uses it as a gas under a water pressure of six inches or less, may find processes described in detail in the Progressive Age, and in other technical journals. Suffice it to say that the methods in use in this country and abroad are simple and effective. The purified acetylene is delivered in strong steel cylinders, which may be placed in a special building or case and need not be handled by the consumer. It has been proved by the exhaustive experiments of the eminent French chemist Berthelot that liquefied acetylene in cylinders can not be exploded by blows or shocks to the closed cylinder. If it is exploded, however, by causing a spark within the cylinder, the explosive force is very great, being about equal to that of gun cotton.

The use of the liquefied acetylene is so simple and clean that the attention of inventors was first turned to this mode of supply. It may in future come again into prominence despite the present strong feeling against it, its use in many cities being prohibited. This feeling was caused by a number of explosions, accompanied by loss of life. Three of these explosions occurred in factories for liquefying acetylene; one in a factory where liquid acetylene regulators were made; several in buildings of consumers. In October, 1896, Pictet's works in Paris were wrecked by the explosion of a cylinder filled with liquid acetylene; evidence proved that the cylinder was held in a vise, and that the two workmen killed were at the ends of a wrench, closing or opening the valve, supposing the cylinder to be empty. The explosion was caused either by a spark from friction in turning the screw, or by the too sudden opening of the valve and releasing the pressure, causing a shock sufficient to decompose the liquid. In December, 1896, the works of G. Isaac, in Berlin, were destroyed by an explosion in the condenser where the cooled acetylene was liquefied by pressure; Isaac and three workmen were killed. Evidence showed that through carelessness warm water instead of cold water was in contact with the condenser, thus warming the liquid and increasing the pressure to a point which burst the condenser. In December, 1897, the works of the Dickerson & Suckert Acetylene Gas Liquefying and Distributing Company in Jersey City were destroyed