A history of the growth of the steam-engine . he paddles areturned upon the pins, EF. A is the centre of the paddle-wheel, and C C are arms. Circular hoops, or bands, con-nect all of the arms, each of which carries a float. Theyare all thus tied together, forming a very firm and power-ful combination to resist external forces. The steamboat Philadelphia was built in the year 1813,and the young naval architect took advantage of the oppor-tunity to introduce several new devices, including screw- 272 THE MODERN STEAM-ENGINE. bolts in place of tree-nails, and diagonal knees of wood andof iron. Two
A history of the growth of the steam-engine . he paddles areturned upon the pins, EF. A is the centre of the paddle-wheel, and C C are arms. Circular hoops, or bands, con-nect all of the arms, each of which carries a float. Theyare all thus tied together, forming a very firm and power-ful combination to resist external forces. The steamboat Philadelphia was built in the year 1813,and the young naval architect took advantage of the oppor-tunity to introduce several new devices, including screw- 272 THE MODERN STEAM-ENGINE. bolts in place of tree-nails, and diagonal knees of wood andof iron. Two years later he altered the engines of this boat,and arranged them to work steam expansively. A littlelater he commenced using anthracite coal, which had beendiscovered in 1791 by Philip Ginter, and introduced atWilkesbarre, Pa., in the smith-shops, some years before theRevolution. It had been used in a peculiar grate devised byJudge Pell, of that town, in 1808. Oliver Evans also hadused it in stoves even earlier than the latter date, and at. Fig. 87.—The Feathering Paddle-Wheel. about the same time it had been .used in the blast-furnace ^at Kingston. Stevens was the first of whom we have rec-ord who was thoroughly successful in using, as a steam-coal,the new and almost unmanageable fuel. He fitted up the Bighop. STEAM-NAVIGATION. 273 boiler of the steamboat Passaic for it in 1818, and adoptedanthracite as a steaming-coal. He used it in a cupola-fur-nace in the same year, and its use then rapidly became gen-eral in the Eastern States. Stevens continued his work of improving the beam-en-gine for many years. He designed the now universally-used skeleton-beam, which is one of the characteristic featuresof the American engine, and placed the first example of thislight and elegant, yet strong, construction on the steamerHoboken in the year 1822. He built the Trenton, which wasthen considered an extraordinarily powerful, fast, and hand-some vessel, two years afterward, and placed t
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1870, bookidc, booksubjectsteamengines
