Freer On Liquid Air

FREER ON LIQUID AIR

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WHAT LIQUID AIR IS LIKE

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The Claims of the New York Inventor Criticized.

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Liquid Air is 312 Degrees Below Zero

in Temperature, Evaporates Slowly and Destroys Tissues Like Fire.

Has a Great Bearing on Electricity.

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Now that the university at the opening of the next college year is to begin the manufacture of liquid air, one of the latest discoveries in science, all that can be learned on the subject will be of interest. A long interview with Prof. Paul Freer, under whose charge the new machine will be placed, is published in yesterday's Tribune and proceeds as follows:

"What is liquid air, professor?"

"The term is self-explanatory."

Each word is used in its simplest, commonest meaning. Liquid air is air reduced to the consistency of a liquid; air liquified." 

"What does it look like?"

"Water."

"Is it blue, red or green?"

"It is slightly bluish, but generally speaking, it is said to be colorless, like clear water. It can be poured, like water; It can be drunk like water; but I wouldn't advise you to drink it."

"It would kill you in a second. it's so intensely cold that it would literally freeze you to death; its temperature in 312 degrees below zero." 

"But if it is so much colder than the normal air, how can it be handled i the air? Would it not evaporate almost instantly?'

"It evaporates very slowly; it is surrounded by a jacket of its own chemical self, protecting it in a measure from the hasty evaporation in air. This also explains why liquid air, the coldest thing known, burns like a coal of fire. It does not burn in the sense that fire burns; but it produces the same result, that is, it destroys the tissues."

"Then you dare not touch or handle liquid air?"

"Oh, yes; if you handle it gently. the jacket of its own chemical self that constantly surrounds it protects the form contact with the intensely cold liquid air. But if you should plunge your hand violently through the jacket, the fearful cold would destroy the tissues of your flesh and produce the effect we call a burn."

"Liquid air is not absolutely new. It has been known for a hundred years that all gases are capable of liqufaction; the only trouble was to find proper mechanical means; and then, too, heretofore, it was not possible to condense gases, except in very small quantities. All gases have been reduced to a liquid condition, except hydrogen, and now the liquid air process will doubtless make it possible to reduce even hydrogen."

"What will be the commerical uses of liquid air?"

"It is too early to say. It has a remarkable bearing on many chemical facts, especially on what is known as the chemistry of low temperature. It will make possible processes and reactions heretofore largely theoretical."

"Has it any bearing on electricity?"

"Yes, a wonderful bearing, and I doubt not great results will eventually come here. You see, according to the chemistry of low temperature, there is a point where all conductors are of equal efficiency. that is iron is as good as copper, zinc as good as lead, and so on. With the aid of liquid air, it will now be possible to determine the physical and chemical values of conductors, according to an entirely new method;  and what the outcome will be no man at this stage can say. it might possibly revolutionize certain processes in applied electricity."

"I will read you a paragraph from Tripler's report and ask you what you think of it, from a scientific stand-point. It is as follows:

"It is bewildering to dream of the possibilities of a source of power that costs nothing. Think of the ocean greyhound unecumbered with coal-bunkers, and sweltering boilers, and smokestacks, making her power as she sails, from the free sea air around her! Think of the boilerless locomotive running without a fire-box or fireman, or without need of water tanks or coal chutes, gathering from the air as it passes the power which turns its driving wheels? With costless power, think how travel and freight rates must fall, bringing bread and meat more cheaply to our tables and cheaply manufactured clothing more cheaply to our backs. Think of the possibilities of aerial navigation with power which requires no heavy machinery, no storage-batteries, no coal-but I will take up these possibilities later."

"I think this is fanciful," said the professor. "for the reason that liquid air, to be commercially possible, as it looks to me at this stage, would have to be confined to sources that are essentially free and natural, as water power. If, on the on the hand, you have to use coal to produce the power to liquefy air, the cost would outweigh the results."

"You notice Tripler says that he can make 10 gallons of liquified air from three initial gallons, and go on producing liquid air from liquid air, after the fashion of perpetual motion?"

"It is a physical impossibility. According to this, a machine of this character starting with three, could produce a unlimited amount of the air, if allowed to work steadily, which could be done, because no extraneous energy would be required. It would then only be a question of time before all the air in existence could be liquefied. this reduction to an absurdity shows the fallacy of the claim."

The machine which will be placed in the university through the kindness of Prof. Brush, the great electrician is manufactured by Linde in Germany. Said the professor in answer to the question:

"Is it a very complicated machine?"

"No, it is not."

"Then why does it take so long to install one?"

"There are, so far as I know, only two men who advertise liquid air machines. One is Tripler of New York, who professes to be the discoverer of liquid air; the other in Linde, of Berlin. But the New York man will not deliver any machines; at any rate, he is not prepared to deliver them; so we will get one of Linde. the price is about $1,200. the machine weights about 2,600 pounds. It is really a simple piece of machinery. Is wall are tested to resist a pressure of 200 atmospheres."

"Is Tripler really the inventor of the liquid air machine?"

"I am not prepared to say. If Tripler discovered liquid air, or made the first liquid air machine, he must have been very secretive. I have in my study a German scientific magazine printed almost four years ago, in which Linde's discovery and his machine are described at length: and there is a diagram showing the essential feature of the machine. However, as I say, the scientific world will take no part in this matter, especially at this time. we are more concerned with liquid air, itself, than in any dispute between inventors of machines. I wish, however, you would say a word for Linde.

An eastern magazine, which recently had a long article aout liquid air, gives all the credit to Tripler. Linde's name is not even mentioned."

"Linde has an international reputation. I never heard of Tripler before. Linde is a wonderful mathematician and chemist."