NEW INVENTIONS.
A New Brick Machine.
Messrs. Culbertson, McMillen & Co. of Cincinnati, have recently put in successful operation, a new machine, a description of which is given in a Cincinnati paper, as follows:
'A frame of fourteen moulds, one brick to each is drawn by the power of steam between two press rollers, the lower one of which enables the frame to support the pressure of the upper roller, and being run through backwards and forwards equalizes the pressure over the entire face of the brick. These, after undergoing in this mode a pressure of nearly one hundred tons to each brick, a pressure which covers clay, apparently perfectly dry, with a coat of glossy moisture, are raised above the surface of the mould by parallel levers, and are then delivered over to a bench or table by self-acting machinery, whence they are taken in barrows to the stacker at the kiln.
'The dry clay is shoveled into a hopper, and if more of the material is pressed into a mould than serves to make a brick, a knife which ranges with the surface of the mould, shaves off the surplus.
'Two hands shoveling, two more taking off, and one at the barrow, constitute a gang of five persons who turn out from 30,000 to 35,000 per day of ten hours. As brick makers' days are from sun to sun, say twelve working hours per day, during the season, from 46 to 50,000 bricks, per day, may be made by a single machine. This is, however, by no means the most important feature in the invention.
'In the ordinary mode of making bricks, the manufacturer cannot begin operations for the season, until the spring has so far advanced that working in wet clay will no longer chill his moulders' hands. On the same account, he loses also morning hours, until the advance of summer enables his hands to put in the whole period of daylight. He loses, also, sometimes days together—from the entire stoppage of his operations in the rainy weather, which forbids the bricks being put out to dry. In making press brick, all these difficulties are obviated. As a theory, operations in this mode can go on throughout the entire winter, frost never extending into solid clay; but as a practical business, it can be conveniently carried on two months earlier and one month later than in the ordinary mode. Pressed brick, made by these machines, are also stronger than their competitive article, the last of equal hardness in burning, always giving way when struck by the pressed bricks, as I have witnessed. Indeed, it cannot be otherwise, the one being porous and the other as compact as the enormous pressure employed can make it.
'The machine, it must be apparent, offers peculiar advantages in turning out brick without occupying the ordinary brick yard space necessary for spreading wet brick out to dry. It affords great economy in time, owing to its operations being independent of frost or rains. To every new and thriving place commencing the making of bricks, it dispenses with the necessity of bringing skilful workmen from other places—in short, it enables every man to be his own brick-maker. Under these considerations, I anticipate an extensive sale of these machines, especially for places at a distance.'
Marble Saw Mills.
We are informed that a large mill for sawing marble is in course of erection at Brandon, Vt. The marble in that vicinity is principally of a beautiful white, and of a fine texture, though not very hard.
Railroad Locks.
It is reported that locks for elevating railroad trains, from one level to another, are coming into successful use in France. It appears to us to be much behind the age, since, by certain American inventions, an ordinary train may be elevated 100 feet in five minutes, by the engine alone.
The Vertical Propeller.
We have alluded to this subject in a former number, and now present one of the several plans which have been introduced within the present year, although we are not fully authorised to give the name of the inventor of this particular plan. We have preferred to represent the paddles and crank unconnected with an apparent vessel or section thereof, but must require the reader to suppose that the line A B is the level of the railing of the boat, and that the crank-shaft E projects from the side, while the crank-pivot governs the motion of the walking bar D E, and with it the paddles, which are supposed to be just now dipping in the surface of the water. It will be understood that the motion of the walking bar being circular, and that of the heads of the paddles being vertical and nearly rectilinear, the motion of the blades of the paddles must be elliptical, inclining to the horizontal; and that the position of the paddles is kept so nearly vertical that they will meet with less resistance in entering or leaving the water than those of a common paddle wheel, while the atmospheric resistance to be encountered thereby is much less. There appears no reasonable doubt that this plan might be made to succeed well on a larger scale, though it is very doubtful whether any of the steamboat proprietors can be persuaded to adopt it until it has been more thoroughly tested by experiment.
A Great Astronomical Discovery.
A late number of an astronomical journal published at Altona, near Hamburg, contains a long article by Dr. Maedler, director of the Dorpat Observatory, Russia, well known to the astronomical world, in which he announces the extraordinary discovery of the grand central star or sun, about which the universe of stars is revolving, our own sun and system among the rest.
This discovery, the result of many years of incessant toil and research, has been deduced by a train of reasoning and an examination of facts scarcely to be surpassed in the annals of science.
He announces his discovery in the following language: 'I therefore pronounce the Pleiades to be the central group of that mass of fixed stars limited by the stratum composing the Milky Way and Alcyene as the individual star of this group, which, among all others, combines the greatest probability of being the true Central Sun.'
By a train of reasoning, which I shall not attempt to explain, he finds the probable parallax of this great central star to be six thousandths of one second of arc, and its distance to be 34 millions of times the distance of the sun, or so remote that light, with a velocity of 12 millions of miles per minute, requires a period of 537 years to pass from the great centre to our sun.
As a first rough approximation, he deduces the period of the revolution of our sun, with all its train of planets, satellites and comets, about the grand centre, to be eighteen millions two hundred thousand years.
Ocean Steam Navigation.
The 'Ocean Steam Company,' which has the patronage of the United States Government to the amount of $400,000 per annum, are getting on rapidly with the first steamship of their line. She is to be completed and commence running on the first of March next.
