MOISTENING THE AIR IN MILLS.

BY W. V. WALLACE, HINSDALE, MASS.

To secure the most favorable conditions of the atmosphere, in respect to temperature and moisture, in rooms where textile goods are made, is a matter of great interest to the manufacturer. I accept with pleasure the invitation of your board of government to present to the association a statement of my experience in providing methods for controlling and regulating these conditions.

It was, I think, in 1882 that Professor Ordway, of the Institute of Technology, while looking at my cold-air machines, encouraged me to adapt them to textile uses. Mr. Ordway has much to answer for, as it launched me into a long line of tedious and expensive experiments, reaching from that day to this, having worked continuously these years, and tried a number of methods in different mills, with varied results.

I will say, in brief, what all well know. The processes that the cotton is put through deprive it of its natural moisture, charge it with electricity, making it unpliable and difficult to work, with loss by fly, and breaking threads, hot yarns, etc. That textiles work smooth, elastic and firm in moist air, is, I think, conceded.

The best way to produce and control the proportion of moisture is to be considered. Moisture or heat, some men

say.

These terms are synonymous, as warm air attracts moisture. It is apparent that the overheated, enervating workroom, closed, and perhaps charged with steam, is unnecessary, and a cruelty to the help; as in my judgment a fresh, breathable air is suited to the best results in the running of the work. A damp air cannot be artificially

THE WALLACE FOG MACHINE.

conveyed any distance, as friction rarefies it, and it is no longer damp. Therefore blasts of damp air are undesirable, having the additional objections of wetting the belts, blowing the dirt around, wetting the cards, and making it too cold and raw on a dry winter morning, when moisture is most needed.

Puffs of vapor, of ordinary water temperature, may be placed at short intervals; which is perhaps the only practicable and satisfactory method, as cold vapor does not lodge on the machinery or flooring. And this plan must be straight, simple and strong, to resist breaking belts and the famous cross-eyed boy with his broom; not obstructing the light, and well out of the way. The vapor must be fine enough to float in and be absorbed by the air; and here it is proper to say that the valves with fine grooves (as holes cannot be made small enough, and kept free) made this cold vapor in the open air possible.

These valves are adjustable, and will give more or less vapor, as the changeable atmosphere from day to day requires. In the same manner they adapt themselves to any water pressure, from twenty to two hundred pounds or more, and have the final merit of producing a fine vapor, and being easily kept free and clear. A single movement of one lever cleans a line extending the length of the room. A movement of the same lever will produce more or less vapor on the whole line. They are made of non-corrosive, bronze metal, are strong and durable. Each machine has a water-cock, and may be separately shut off. To illustrate their working capacity, in a room seventy by three hundred feet, I would recommend forty machines, which, with the plain lines of pipe, makes this the simplest and cheapest plan, at the same time producing perhaps the only satisfactory results. A piper who can attach a pipe to posts or the floor above, and pitch it so that water will run through it, can put them up.. There are no tangles nor goose necks in the way of belts and brooms. There is no way by which you can wet the machinery or floor with them, and the amount of water con

sumed is not appreciable; and they have no belts, nor expense for motive power; no oiling; and, once in line, there is practically no cost whatever in running them a period of years. One may be placed near the top of each window, which will freshen and cool the air of summer, invigorating the help and assisting the work at the same time, while this cool vapor makes the air fresh and breathable. It is not in one hundred degrees of heat proper that we suffer; it is the withdrawing of the oxygen, and its formation into floating globules, under suitable conditions, that makes the air oppressive. Natural water, mechanically vaporized, renews the oxygen, and, without materially affecting the thermometer, does, for breathing purposes, reduce the conditions of the atmosphere to a comparatively comfortable degree. Note the vicinity of a fountain and of freshly sprinkled floors or pavements. If colder air is desirable, and air motion is not harmful, four of these valves. on a circular pipe two feet in diameter, with a simple pan in the centre, will produce and radiate a large quantity of cold vapor.

This device, complete and attached to the floor above, costing sixty dollars, will give double the results of any machine made for the purpose. Being open piping, it does not obstruct the light, and it is easily cleaned. I think the methods named are the most effective and least expensive that can be obtained. There is practically no wear to the machines, and they are so simply constructed and worked that they can easily be applied in lines to the floor above, or tucked in here or there, underneath other machinery.

Repeating, this cool vapor does not attach itself to polished surfaces, like steam. Some years ago, while putting into the mills large cylinder spray and fan machines. (all of this species of air moisteners are crude, expensive, and consume considerable power and water to run them), I learned that mill men treated the moistening of the air as a side issue, upon which they were willing to put but little care and attention, and less expense. I have worked hard

and long to meet them on this plane, and I now offer to them a machine, the simplicity of which should have suggested itself earlier, which will moisten and keep moist five thousand cubic feet of highly heated and electrified air for ten dollars; and the cost of running this machine is the water it discharges into the air, with only a dropping of waste; and this dropping may be used again, if wished.

The difficulty has been to produce so fine a stream and keep it free, which is accomplished by the slotted valve. Any further time may better be given to an examination of the machine, which is present, and seems to be a final solution of the air-moistening problem.

The PRESIDENT. If any gentleman would like to have the machine explained, we have a model here.

Mr. POLAND. (Illustrating with model.) This machine gives an illustration in connection with' this small pump, which is no part of the machine. It shows the fine vapor produced by two very fine streams of water cast upon the plate. That vapor is carried by the air and the motion of belts running, so that it finds every part of the room. The machine is operated simply by the water pressure. This is a little pump with some water here (indicating) in this pan That is not part of the machine. I have some circulars here which are prepared for circulation among the mills, and they show the method of putting them up.

A MEMBER. How much water pressure does it take? Mr. POLAND. From sixty to eighty is the best, -any city or water pressure from a tank; a pressure of eighty pounds is preferable to sixty pounds, and they can be worked with a pump where other pressure is not obtainable. The machine is hung from the ceiling, the pipe running along the ceiling, another pipe running along here, in which this enters, carrying off the waste, which runs out through this small pipe here. There is a separate valve for each machine to let the water off, and also a waste pump to blow off whatever sediment may accumulate in the course of time; but