COAL-SAVING SUPERHEATER.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXIX, Issue 3163, 8 March 1911, Page 2

COAL-SAVING SUPERHEATER.

A BAIL WAY LATENT. Railway managrs will bo interested in the example of some of the principal British railways, which have for some time past been conducting a series of experiments with a device which promises to effect a large saving in the coal consumption bill (writes the “British- Australasian,” London). During the year 1809—the latest figures to hand—the coal consumed on the British railways readied the enormous total of 12,272,900 tons, so it can readily be appreciated that even a small proportionate saving would mean a huge reduction in the working expenses. The device now being successfully tried is the Phoenix Superheater, ,a British invention, which, at small cost, can be fixed to any existing locomotive without requiring any special design or alteration in the heating surface of the boiler. • The main idea of this superheater is to further heat the steam, after it has been generated. by passing it through a series of tubes. ' The steam thus intensified increases in volume from 20 to 35 per cent, or, in other words, from 20 to 25 per cent, less steam is required than when ordinary saturated steam is used. This, it is claimed, means'a saving in coal consumption of about 23 per cent. Those experiments having an important hearing on the dividend earnings of the -railways, should be of particular interest to "railway inventors.