The Power Of Water When Reduced To Vapour By Heat
Whatever force water may have while its parts remain together, is
nothing, if compared to the almost incredible power with which its
parts are endued, when they are reduced to vapour by heat. Those
steams which we see rising from the surface of boiling water, and
which to us appear feeble, yet, if properly conducted, acquire immense
force. In the same manner as gunpowder has but small effect, if
suffered to expand at large, so the steam issuing from water is
impotent, where it is permitted to evaporate into the air; but where
confined in a narrow compass, as, for instance, where it rises in an
iron tube shut up on every side, it there exerts all the wonders of
its strength. Muschenbrook has proved by experiment, that the force
of gunpowder is feeble when compared to that of rising steam. A
hundred and forty pounds of gunpowder blew up a weight of thirty
thousand pounds: but, on the other hand, a hundred and forty pounds of
water, converted by heat into steam, lifted a weight of seventy-seven
thousand pounds; and would lift a much greater, if there were means of
giving the steam more heat with safety; for the hotter the steam the
greater is its force.
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