The Hungarian machine, so called from its having been employed in drain ing a mine in Chemnitz, in Hungary, produces its action by the condensation of a confined portion of air, produced by the descent of a high column of water contained in a pipe, and therefore acts with a force proportionate to the weight of such column. Its general form is shown in the annexed cut, by which it will appear that it is an exceedingly simple and useful machine, admitting of many modifications and applications; but it can be used only in hilly countries, or situa tions where the source of water by which it is to be worked is as much above the top of the well as the water to be raised is underneath it. In this figure a is supposed to be a well, or the shaft of a mine, from the bottom of which it is necessary to raise the water standing at the level 6 6. c c is the surface of the ground at the to of the well or shaft, at which the discharged water must have an opportunity of escaping, either by running to waste, or being con verted to some useful purpose; and d is the spring or other elevated source from whence the supply of water for working the machine may be obtained. The machine itself consists of three cisterns, chests, or reservoirs, two of which at e and f must be made very strong, and perfectly air-tight, while the third at d may be weaker, and open at the top, as it is merely for collecting and retaining the spring, rain, or other water for working the machine. The lowest close chest or reservoir a must be sunk be low the surface b b of the water in the shaft or well a, but must not come into contact with its bottom, otherwise the water would entering the chest by the valve g, which opens in wards for its admission. An open pipe A h ?asses from very near the bottom of this chest, through its top, in an air tight manner, and proceeds upwards in the shaft as far as the surface of the Freund, where it bends over to deliver its water, as at h c. Another open pipe i i, which may be of rather smaller dimensions than the last, proceeds from the to of the lower chest a to very near the top of the second chest f ; and a third pipe, k 1, of the same capacity as the first, proceeds from very near the bottom of the second close chest, up to the bottom of the high reservoir d, but has a cock or valve at 1, by which it can occasionally be shut or opened. A cock or valve, of large dimensions, is also fixed at es, by which the second chest! can be emptied of its water, and a smaller cock is fixed higher up, as at n, for discharging its air. To set the machine in action nothing more is neces sary than to shut the cocks 1 and m, and open the cock n, from which the air previously contained in the lower chest will escape, and its place will be filled up by the water b b, which will pass through the valve g, until the chest e is completely filled. Tbat done, the air cock n is to be shut, and the water cock l opened, when a column of water, equal to the full height and pres sure of the cistern d, will rush down the pipe k 1, and by filling the chest will expel its air, which has no other opportunity of escaping but by the open pipe i i, down which it will pass, and produce a pressure on the surface of the water in the lower chest equal to the entire height of the column k 1; and the air thus thrown into the chest e, being in a condensed state, will form the water previously in that chest up the pipe h Is, from whence it will be dis chaiged at c. The lower chest e will now be filled with air, while the upper chest f will be occupied by water: therefore the cock 1 must be shut, and that at on opened, when the whole of the water from f will be discharged at c, and will give the air in e an opportunity of returning again into f through the pipe i i ; and as the air from e escapes, its place will be occupied by a new charge of water, which will rise through the valve g, and again the lower chest e, and prepare it for a second discharge. All, therefore, that is necessary to keep the machine in action is to open the cocks 1 and ? alternately, that is to say, to keep the cock 1 open as long as any water flows from the discharging pipe at h c, and as soon as the efflux ceases, to shut the cock 1, and open m to discharge the water from f, and permit the lower chest e to fill, which will be effected whenever water ceases to flow from as. The coal m must then be shut, and 1 opened, and so on alternately, which may easily be done mechanically, and without superintendence, by using a part of the impelling water from d, or that which has been discharged from h c, and which may be employed to turn a small water-wheel, or to fill two small cisterns in which floats are made to act. Mr. John W. Boswell devised a contrivance for answering this same purpose, which will be found fully detailed in the second volume of Dr. Gregory's excellent Treatise on Mechanics, where this simple machine is described under several forms and modifications. It must not be supposed that filling the middle vessel f with water will discharge the whole of the water out of e, otherwise disappointment in its effects will ensue ; because, although water is nearly incompressible, air is highly elastic, and the air in e will be compressed into less than its natural bulk, or will be condensed with a force equivalent to the pressure of the perpendicular column of water h h, which it has to overcome; and as atmospheric pressure was shown, when speaking of the pumps under the second head or division, to be only equal to the support of a column of water about 33 feet in height, so if we imagine this to be the height of the Or h h, that column of water would require one of double atmospheric elasticity to support it, and hence the air in e will be condensed to half its former volmne, and, therefore, discharge but half the volume of water, although f should be completely filled. Dr. Gregory further describes a curious phenomenon which takes place in the working of this machine, and which never fails to create surprise in the strangers who visit it, and to whom it is usually shown. That is, when the efflux at h c has stopped, if the cock a be opened, the water and air rush out together with prodigious violence, and the drops of water are changed into hail or lumps of ice, issuing with such force as frequently to pierce a hat if held against them, like pistol bullets. This rapid congelation is a re markable instance of the general fact, that air, by suddenly expanding, generate cold, its capacity for heat being increased.
The Water Ram, or Belier Hydrauligue, as it was called by its inventor, M. Montgolfier, of Paris, is a highly useful and simple machine, for the purpose of raising water without the expenditure of any other force than that which is produced by the momentum or moving force of a part of the water that is to be raised. The effect of this machine depends entirely upon momentum, a the new quantity of force that is generated whenever a body is put into motion; and the effect of this is so great as to give the apparatus the appearance of acting in defiance of the established laws of hydrostatic equilibrium ; for moving column of small height is made to overcome and move another column much higher than itself. The form and construction of the hydraulic ram is shown
in the figure on the next page. Supposes to represent a reservoir, or the source of a spring, which is continually overflowing and running to waste by meson of a channel a few feet lower than itself, as at the level line p p. Instead of permitting the _water to flow over the sides of o, let it be conducted to the level of p p by means of pipes q q connected with the side of the reservoir, and terminating by an orifice r, in which a conical or other is placed, so an to be capable of effectually closing the pipe when such valve is drawn upwards. t an adjustable weight, fixed on the spindle of the valve a, by means of which the valve is kept down and open ; any water, therefore, that is in the cistern o col flow down the pipe q q, and escape at the orifice r, so long as the valve remains down ; but the instant it is raised and shut, all motion of the water is suspended. Thus situated the adjustment of the weight t must take place, and by adding to, or subtracting from it, it must be made just so heavy as to be capable of sinking or forcing its way downwards against the upward pressure of the water, the force of which will depend upon the perpendicular distance from the surface of the water in o, to its point of discharge at r (represented by the dotted line o v) ; consequently, if the valve a be raised by the hand or otherwise, all motion of the water in the pipe q q will cease, but the instant the valve is released, it will fall down and permit the water to escape. The water by its motion acquires momentum and new force, and consequently is no longer equal to the column o v, to which the valve has been adjusted, but is superior to it, by which it is enabled to overpower the resistance of the weight t, and it carries the valve up with it, and closes the orifice r. This is no sooner done than the water is constrained to become again stationary, by which the momentum is lost, and the valve and weight again become superior, and fall, thus reopening the orifice, and permitting the water to flow again ; and as the pressure of the water and the weight of the valve each alternately preponderate, the valve is kept in a constant state of vibration, or of opening and shutting, without any external aid whatever. Such is the principle upon which the motion of the water in the pipe q ? is produced; but the motion generated cannot be instantly annihilated; and it is not only of sufficient power to raise the valve a, but likewise to burst open the lower end of the pipe q g, unless a sufficient vent be provided, by which this accumulated force can escape. Accordingly a second valve u is placed near the lower end of these pipes, and is made to open upwards into an air vessel w, with a discharging pipe x, and, consequently, whenever the valve s is closed, the water which would otherwise have flowed from the orifice r now opens the valve u and enters the air vessel, until the spring of the con tained air overcomes the gradually decreasing force of the momentum, when the valve u closes, and that at a opens to permit the water to make a second blow or pulsation, and in this way the action of the machine continues un ceasingly, without any external aid, so long as it is supplied with water and remains in repair. A small running stream is necessary for this machine, as the water at o should be kept at one constant elevation to ensure the perfection of its action. A much greater quantity of water likewise escapes at the orifice r between the pulsations than can be raised in the delivery pipe x, particularly if it extend to any considerable height, for the comparative quantity of water discharged through z, and permitted to run to waste at r, must always depend upon the respective perpendicular heights of the pressing column o v and the delivered or resisting column w a, and the rapidity of the pulsations will like wise depend upon the same circumstances. Mr. Millington, from whose Epitome of Natural Philosophy the above description is taken, and who has erected several of these machines in different parts of England, which gave great satis faction, in order to show their efficacy gives the following particulars of one, which, at the time when he wrote, bad been in constant use for about two years. The reservoir o is a basin of about 10 feet square and 2 feet deep, formed partly in limestone rock, and partly in brickwork, the supply of water being from a natural spring. The pipe q q is of cast iron, 14 yards long, and 2 inches in diameter. The piece at the end, containing the air vessel and the valves, is about fifteen inches long; the valves 1 # inch each in diameter, and made of brass; contents of the air vessel, about 1 gallon. The height from the surface of the water at o to its point of discharge at r, is 6 feet 4 inc es, measured perpendicularly. The delivery pipe x is of lead, 1 inch in diameter, andhorizontally under the ground 104 feet, and then rises to height of 54 feet 3 inches above the discharge valve at r, where it delivers the water into a large cistern. The water is thus raised 47.11 inches above the surface of the spring which supplies it, and this by a fall of only 6 feet 4 inches. So circumstanced, the valve a makes about 50 vibrations, or opens 50 times in a minute, when it loses about two quarts • of water, and injects nearly a quarter of a pint into the elevated cistern at each pulsation ; the water lost being to that which is raised nearly as 17 to 1. This may appear a small quantity of water, but when it is recollected that the machine is at work night and day (unless purposely stopped), and furnishes six quarts of water every minute, this will be found to be a supply adequate to a very large household establishment. The construction above described is, however, incomplete, as, owing to the mutual incorporation which takes place between air and water, the successive quantities of water that are impelled into the air vessel would soon absorb the whole of the air contained in it, and it would cease to afford that elasticity which is indispensable to the working of the machine. This was discovered in France by M. Montgolfier, who added an improvement to the machine by introducing a very small shif ing valve, opening inwards into the lower part of the air vessel, but kept shut by a small spring. This is shown in the separate shaded figure above the lag described, and represents an improved form of the air vessel. This valve is self-acting, and effectually prevents the escape of any air or water from the air vessel; but when the water is thrown back by the shutting of the valve s, it produces an instantaneous vacuum at the end of the pipe q, upon which the shifting valve opens, and admits a sufficient quantity of the external air into the air vessel to keep it constantly replenished, and by this simple addition the water ram is rendered continuous in its action.