Page:Reflections on the Motive Power of Heat.djvu/283

Rh with a piston, or in any other variable space; finally, to throw it out again into the atmosphere, or even to make it pass under a steam-boiler in order to utilize the temperature remaining.

The principal difficulties that we should meet in this mode of operation would be to enclose the furnace in a sufficiently strong envelope, to keep the combustion meanwhile in the requisite state, to maintain the different parts of the apparatus at a moderate temperature, and to prevent rapid abrasion of the cylinder and of the piston. These difficulties do not appear to be insurmountable.

There have been made, it is said, recently in England, successful attempts to develop motive power through the action of heat on atmospheric air. We are entirely ignorant in what these attempts have consisted—if indeed they have really been made.

.—The result given here was furnished by an engine whose large cylinder was 45 inches in diameter and 7 feet stroke. It is used in one of the mines of Cornwall called Wheal Abraham. This result should be considered as somewhat exceptional, for it was only temporary, continuing but a single month. Thirty millions of lbs. raised one English foot per bushel of coal of 88 lbs. is generally regarded as an excellent result for steam-engines.