Fire prevention and fire extinction

by James Braidwood

These joints, although requiring three or four turns to close them up, yet as it is only the ring D which requires to be turned, it can easily be done with the hand alone without the use of wrenches. Although, when the whole length of hose has been jointed, it may be as well to send a man with a pair of wrenches to set the joints firm; this, however, is by no means absolutely necessary; if the joints are kept in proper order a man can secure them sufficiently with the hand.

There is also a facility in taking turns out of the hose, which no other but a swivel joint affords. By slackening a single turn any twist may be taken out, without undoing the joint or stopping the engine, while, from the number of turns required to close the joints, there is no chance of the screw being by any accident undone. In order to prevent the threads from being easily damaged, they should be of a pretty large size, not more than five or six to the inch. For the same reason also the thread should be a little rounded.

As it sometimes happens that the screws are damaged by falling on the street, or by heavy bodies striking them, whenever the hose have been used the joints should be tried by a steel gauge-screw, to be kept for that purpose. This ought to be particularly attended to, as, on arriving at a fire, it is rather an awkward time to discover that a joint has been damaged, while the delay thus occasioned may be attended with very serious consequences.

Four Bundles of Sheepskin and Lay-cord.—These are simply four or five stripes of sheepskin, each about three or four inches broad. When a leak occurs in a length of hose which cannot be easily replaced at the time, one or more pieces of sheepskin are wrapt tightly over the leak and tied firmly with a piece of cord. This is but an indifferent method of mending, but I do not know of any other which can be so readily applied with the same effect. If another length of hose can be substituted for the leaky one it is better to do so; but that is not always at hand, nor does it always happen that time can be spared for the purpose.

Four Lengths of Suction-pipe.—These are generally made of leather, riveted tightly over a spiral worm of hoop-iron, about three-quarters of an inch broad, a piece of tarred canvas being placed between the worm and the leather. They are usually made from six to eight feet long, with a copper strainer screwed on the farther end, to prevent as much as possible any mud or dirt from getting into the engine with the water. It is of advantage to carry four lengths of suction-pipe, as they can be joined to reach the water; if one is damaged the others will still be serviceable.

The suction-pipes are more troublesome to rivet than the common hose, and are done in the following manner:—After the joints are fixed on the spiral worm, and it is covered with the tarred canvas, an iron mandrel longer than the worm is put through it, the edge being rounded to the circle of the inside of the worm. The projecting ends of the mandrel are supported to allow the worm to lie quite clear. One end of the mandrel has a check, that the brass joint may not prevent the worm from lying flat on the mandrel. The leather is then put over the worm, and the rivets being put into one side, a small thin mandrel is laid over the canvas and the rivets struck down upon it. If the small mandrel be not used the heads of the rivets are apt to lie unequally on the worm.

Three Wrenches for Coupling-joints.—These are for tightening the coupling-joints, when that cannot be sufficiently done by hand. When the hose are all put together a man is sent along the whole line with a pair of wrenches to tighten such of the coupling-joints as require it. The wrenches are generally made with a hole to fit the knob on the coupling-joint, and, when used, are placed, one on the nob of the male and another on the nob of the female-screw, so as to pull them in opposite directions.

Two Branch Pipes.—These are taper copper tubes, having a female-screw at one end to fit the coupling-joints of the hose, and a male-screw at the other to receive the jet pipes, one is 4 feet long to use from the outside of a house on fire, the other 12 inches for inside work.

Three Jet-pipes or nozzles of various sizes made to screw on the end of the branch pipe.

A great many different shapes of jet have been tried, and that shown in Fig. 5, I found to answer best when tried with other forms. The old jet was a continuation in a straight line of the taper of the branch, from the size of the hose-screw, to the end of the jet-pipe; this had many inconveniences; the size of the jet could not be increased without making the jet-pipe nearly parallel. As the branches were sometimes 7 feet or 8 feet long, in some instances the orifice at the end of the jet-pipe was larger than that at the end of the branch. The present form of the jet completely obviates this difficulty, as the end of the branch is always 1-1/2 inches diameter.