4
.Editorial.
made in water 150 filthoms deep, tile ship going 6 knots per hour. The wire is protected from rust either by immersion in oil, after the American plan, or in caustic soda, as on board the Hooper.
The Sczaroch, a n e w Russian proj ectile.--A new shell, under the at~ove name, has just been adopted for the Russian artillery, which seems to have certain advantages. When the old st)herieal shell was replaced by the elongated shell, now entirely in use. the argument was the necessity of obtaining a higher initial velocity, widch was possible only with rifled guns. There was not an artilleryman who did not regret the sacrifice thus made of the ricochet shot; a shot extremely usefnl in certain cases, and apparently quite impossible with an elongated projectile. Some two years ago a Russian officer devised a shell which was a time or a percussion shell and at the same time could give the results of a ricochet shot. The sczaroch, as it is called, is an elongated shell, the head of which is completely spherical; a round shell upon the end of an iron cylinder. The two parts are united together by a comparatively slight thickness of metal. When fired, the sczaroeh leaves the gun like an ordinary shell; but when it bursts, the cylindrical part alone flies in pieces, while the sl)herical head contlnues its flight intact and may ricochet for hundreds of yards further. The advantage of such a shell against artillery~ ibr example, is very great. After bursting and scattering its fragments among the guns of the enemy, the head goes on to plunge into the infantry still further back. It is only to be used in Ilussia however, for cannon of moderate size. On lhe Action of Spiegeleisen in the Bessemer P r o c e s s . All investigation into tile fimction performed bv the spiegeleisen when added to tlle Bessemer charge has been made by Bender. A portion of the metal, when ready tbr the charge of spiegeleisen, was run into a white lint elav lnonld "rod slowly cooled. Its structure was coarsely crystalline, "l condition fitw~red by the oxygen contained in it. I t was brittle under the rolls, but tough and hard under the chisel. Upon analysis, it contained 0"35 per cent. of oxygen. The action of the spiegeleisen upon the iron, the author then calculates as fi)llows: The charge of 3,5(10 kilograms lost ten per cent. of slag, leaving3,151) kilograms of metal, whieh at the above percentage, would contain 11"02 kilograms of oxygen. To this, 325 kilograms of spiegeleisen was Mded, containing five per cent. ofc',rl)on and eight per cent. of man-
Items and Novelties.
5
ganese ; i. o., 16"25 kilograms of carbon and 26 kilograms of manganese. Since 55 parts of manganese takes up 16 of oxygen 26 kilograms requires 7"67 kilograms; leaving 3"45 kilograms of oxygen. Moreover, -ts the carbon is also active, as the flame shows, the 3"45 kilograms ~)f oxygen would require 2"58 kilogrants of carbon, which, subtracted from the 16"25 kilograms contained in the st)iegelcisen , leaves 13"67 kilograms of carbon. Before adding this, the Bessemer metal contained 0"08 l)er cent. of carbon, equal to 2"52 kilograms; hence it contained afterward 16"2 kilognmis. Upon analysis, the steel obtained contained only from 0"15 to 0"20 per cent of manganese; hence the author believes that since both the manganese and the carbon added in the spicgeleisen, operate upon the oxygen, the excess of manganese and its equivalent of carbon pass away in the slag, leaving only the above quantity--0"15 to 0"20 per cent---combined in thesteel. As 0"15 per cent. equals 5"17 kilograms of manganese, equivalent to 1"12 kilograms of carbon, the (~trbon lctt would be ( 16"2-1"12 ) 15 ldlograms to about 3,450 kilograms of metal, or 0"43 per cent. Actual experimental determination gave 0"40 per cent. carbon. It appears, theretbre, that from three-fourths to tbur~fifths of the manganese introduced by the spiegeleiscn, is lost in the slag; whether the small portion which the steel retains is of any advantage to it or not~ is yet undecided. )Ioreover, the silicon is slightly increased, and the sull)hur slightly diminished by the addition of the spiegeleisen. The author maintains that the spicgeleisen may be replaced with advantage, both as to quality and quantity of the product, by a good white carburetted iron. The great difficulW with both, however, lies in the thet that the carbonic oxide formed b.v the carbon which they contain, in acting on the oxygen of the Bessemer metal, al)pears to be dissolved in the liquid meted and to be ev(,lved on solidification. This "blowing" as it is termed, is a serious injury to the metal. The author hence thinks it desirable to repl'lce the carbon by a snl)stance which tbrms when nuite(t with oxygen an easy filsible slag instead of a gaseous produet.
On the Temperature obtained in Preezing Mixtures.-One of tile results obtained by Berthelot in his a(hnirable researches in thermo-ehemistry--and bv no memos one of the least important, we may add--is the determination of the law according to which refrigerating mixtures act, thus rendering it p,~ssiblc to ascertain by a very