of acetylene, and to about 110
candles by 60 per cent. of acetylene. The difficulty of employing
mixtures fairly rich in acetylene, or pure acetylene, for railway-
carriage lighting, lies in the poor efficiency of the small burners which
yield from such rich gas a light of 15 to 20 candle-power, such as is
suitable for the purpose. For the lighting of railway carriages it is
seldom deemed necessary to have a flame of more than 20 candle-power, and
it is somewhat difficult to obtain such a flame from oil-gas mixtures
rich in acetylene, unless the illuminative value of the gas is wasted to
a considerable extent. According to Bunte, 15 volumes of coal-gas, 8
volumes of German oil-gas, and 1.5 volumes of acetylene all yield an
equal amount of light; from which it follows that 1 volume of acetylene
is equivalent to 5.3 volumes of German oil-gas.
A lengthy series of experiments upon the illuminating power of mixtures
of oil-gas and acetylene in proportions ranging between 10 and 50 per
cent. of the latter, consumed in different burners and at different
pressures, has been carried out by Borck, of the German State Railway
Department. The figures show that per unit of volume such mixtures may
give anything up to 6.
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