Specification of Thomas Tippett : steam and air engines : and method of applying the same to the propulsion of vessels.

  • Tippett, Thomas.
Date:
1854
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Specification of Thomas Tippett : steam and air engines : and method of applying the same to the propulsion of vessels. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    6/10 (page 4)
    Tippett's Improvements in the Construction and Working of Engines, dfc. -—--- erected immediately above the front of the boiler; the flame and hot vapours are made to circulate, as mentioned, by a proper arrangement of the brickwork, * in which the whole is enclosed by means sufficiently well known to the erectors of furnaces to need more particular description. The combined boiler thus constructed, is to be supplied with water by a forcing pump worked by the 5 engine, which is to make it by a pipe enter the bottom of the preparatory boiler, from the top of which, after receiving some heat, it will pass into the cylindrical boiler, and from thence will rise up the vertical tubes into the semi- cylindrical addition a sufficient height to admit of a large part of it being heated there, though not so high as to prevent it (the said semi-cylindrical addition) 10 from serving also as a steam reservoir by occupying too much of its interior. By constructing my boiler in this manner, I conceive that I shall be able to heat the water in it much quicker and with less expence of fuel than by a common boiler, on account of the much more extensive surface of water that is in it exposed to the action of the fire. 15 Lastly, the new method of propelling vessels, to which I apply the power of my new engine herein-before described, is effected, first, by having two or more hollow cylinders placed horizontally within each vessel at its stern beneath the level of the water, with one of the ends of each opening into the water, but properly secured all round so as to prevent any water from running into go the vessel between its sides and the planks and timbers of the latter; and in those cylinders I cause pistons to work forwards and backwards by means of cranks or other fit modes of effecting the operation by the primary power of my steam 'engine, which means or modes are well known to most engineers, regulating the motion, however, in such a manner that the velocity with which 25 the water is driven out backwards from the vessel shall be considerably greater than that with which it enters the cylinders; and I also, secondly, cause strong metallic rods to be moved back and forwards horizontally through stuffing boxes in the stern of the vessel beneath the level of the water, by means similar to those by which the motion of the said pistons is effected above 30 mentioned; and to the outer ends of these rods I attach by proper joints, vanes, or flat plates, capable of shutting close to the rods, or in their line of direction when said rods are drawn inwards, and of opening outwards from the rods again when these are thrust out backwards from the vessel, to a degree not exceeding a position at right angles to the rods, which may be 35 easily effected by stops fastened to the said vanes, or constructed in the joints by which they are attached to the rods; and these vanes, by pressing against the water with their extended surfaces when the rods are driven outwards, will impel the vessel by their reaction, while on the other hand, by being folded up