Excerpt from Scientific News, Vol. 1: For General Readers, March, 1887 Such, roughly, are a few of the elements which underlie the science Of war-ship design - problems which we may well hope never to see brought to a practical solution. The welsbach incandescent gas burner. - It will be remembered that at the last meeting of the British Associa tion, Mr. Conrad Cooke described in Section G the system of gas-lighting introduced by Dr. Auer von Welsbach, of Vienna. We understand that several public buildings in Vienna are now lighted satisfactorily by this system, and recently a public exhibition of it on a large scale was made at the Marlborough Gallery in London. \ve have not seen a photometric test of the lamp, nor a measurement of its gas consumption, but, speaking generally, it appears to us superior to such lamps as Lewis's with platinum gauze, and Clamond's with a cage made from a preparation of magnesia. All are alike in principle, so far as the production of light by means Of the incandescence Of a refractory substance is concerned; but the Welsbach gauze, or mantle, as it is called, is more easily raised to a white heat, and therefore requires a smaller consumption of gas. The mantle is formed by dipping a piece Of cotton net into a specially prepared solution containing oxides of zirconium and other bodies; it is then dried, and on being held over a Bunsen flame the cotton is burnt, and there remains a network Of the incombustible oxides originally contained in the solution. The mantle is then ready for use, and on being suspended over a special form of atmospheric burner, fitted with a glass chimney, it becomes powerfully incandescent and emits a pleasing white light. Moreover, it is stated that by this system a light equal to 20 standard Sperm candles can be produced with a consumption of only 2% cubic feet of gas per hour. If this is found to be so in practice, and if the mantle is able to stand the rough test 01 ordinary use, it will doubtless be very largely adopted for shops and houses. We believe it is not recommended for use outside buildings, because it requires a glass chimney and is rather susceptible to air currents but even this defect may be overcome as the invention is developed. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.