Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 91.djvu/367

 Popular Science Monthly

��U-:washed Sponges Are Fifty Per Cent Dirt

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��quantities of sponges have found that in buying them at a fixed rate per pound, they were paying too much for plain earth. They now require every carload of sponges to be analyzed. Samples are taken from each car and weighed. They are then put through a standard washing process and weighed again. Fifty per cent impurities have been found in many cases.

��Using Live Steam or Vapor to Save Gasoline

THE device shown below is designed to reduce the consumption of gasoline by introducing live steam or vapor into the intake manifold of an automobile engine, especially on -those carburetors which are difficult to adjust properly. The apparatus consists of a small cylindrical chamber screwed into the exhaust manifold, which contains a rotary valve controlled by a cable from the driver's seat. Hot exhaust gas is introduced into the chamber through a port in the rotary valve, where it meets a small amount of water drawn through a pipe tapped into the water-circulating sys- tem. Meeting the hot gas, the water is turned into steam and thence fed to the in- take manifold through another pipe where it mixes with the fuel from the carburetor to form a more economical mixture. The amount of v.a- „ ,.

Cooling

���ter entering the rotary valve is con- trolled by a small needle valve at the top.

Besides pro- ducing a more econom ic al mixture, the presence of a small amount of water vapor in the cylinders tends to soften the deposit of carbon and retard addi- tional forma- tion.

��ater circulation

��The evaporation-cooled refrigerator is the Cali- fornian's answer to the desert's blistering heat

The Imperial Valley Is Off the Ice-Man's Route: Hence the Burlap Cooler

YOU can fry an egg on a rock in the Imperial Valley of California by letting the sun do the cooking, but a Rockefeller couldn't afford the price of a tumbler of cracked ice. But this does not mean that the Californians have to do without food refrigerators and various cooling devices. J. G. Hill, of Mecca, near the Salton Sea, has contrived an evapora- tion-cooled

��Control wire to steering column

���The principle of the gas-saver involves moist air heated from exhaust gases and introduced into the manifold

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frigerator which requires no ice.

It has a wooden frame- work, and in- cludes numer- ous shelves. Several layers of burlap cover it. A perfo- rated tin can at the top is connected with hose which sprinkles water over the entire burlap surface. The evapora- tion keeps the interior cool.

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