Considerations on destructive fires, and the means of prevention in future / [George William Manby].
- George William Manby
- Date:
- [1816]
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: Considerations on destructive fires, and the means of prevention in future / [George William Manby]. Source: Wellcome Collection.
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![[ 3 ] stantly employed on such occasions, I am also assured, that a small quantity of water well directed, and early applied, will accomplish what, probably, no quantity would effect at a later period. This has excited my attempts to provide some portable and efficient means by which the anxious and often important interval of delay Avould be obviated, and the fire OPPOSED on the first alarm. To attain this object, I propose to apply a small quantity of fluid, in the most efficacious manner, from a portable Machine, (on a principle verv long known in science,) requiring the simplest management, and constructed with as little expence as possible, that it may be w'ithin the means of purchase by numbers, in the hope that many houses will be furnished with it, and at least those, under whose roof combus¬ tible materials are lodged, or property which no insurance can replace, as papers, books, pictures, and other valuables. This engine is to be kept always charged, and when slung across the body of a servant or watchman, is easily carried to any part of the building on fire hotvever difficult of access. On opening the stop-cock, the pressure of condensed air instantly propels a stream of water with considerable force, that may easily be directed with the most exact precision on the part in combustion, a circumstance extremely important, Avhen the incipient fire is not within reach of efforts by the hand, and when the air, heated by the flames, prevents approach to cast water upon it by common means, A portable chest or box containing other engines, charged with water impregnated by a solution of an ingredient best adapted to extinguish fire, tvill be an appendage, that when the first engine has expended its store of antiphlogistic fluid, a supply of others in succession may keep up a constant discharge, (in the manner the Engraving beneath represents,) until regular engines and plenty of asisstance arrive, should the fire not be entirely subdued by these first efforts. combustion, it evaporates into steam from the heat, the addition of other fixed incom¬ bustible ingredients consequently becomes necessary, to make quality supply the place of quantity. To give the most efficacious extinguishing properties to common water has engaged the serious attention of many, and numerous experiments have been made in several countries with that view. It having been rendered more effective to extinguish fire than forty times of the same quantity of common water, is not a matter of speculation but of experience, and has been confirmed by trial made upon buildings erected for that purpose. But the experiments I have made, give to simple ingredients dissolved in water, that will penetrate and fill the pores of the burning substances, a decided preference; they have likewise the superior recommendation of the readiness with which any person may imbue the water with them; tvhile the compounds cannot be had but at considerable cost, nor be prepared without labour and nice accuracy in their proportions.](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b31906618_0002.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
