MR. KEELY AND HIS MOTOR. A SCIENTIFIC OPINION, THE RESULTS OF AN INVESTIGATION BY MR. J. B. KNIGHT — THE MACHINE SAID TO BE A FRAUD — MR. KEELY'S SO CALLED “VAPOR” FOUND TO BE COMPRESSED AIR - THE INVENTOR INDIGNANT AND HIS SUPPORTERS AMAZED.??
Special Dispatch to the New York Times.??
Philadelphia, March 28.—The Keely motor, which has created so much comment, has been subjected to a severe test by Mr. J. B. Knight, Secretary of the Franklin Institute, and a well-known scientific engineer. Mr. Knight's examinations have extended through a period of five months, and as a?result of his labors the alleged wonderful Keely motor takes a back seat, being under a cloud. Mr. Knight intimates that the gauges on the motors registered apparently 11,000 pounds to the? square inch, but he has reason to suspect that the gauges were altered. He holds that the machinery is made large and massive for the purpose of misleading those who care to view it and every one else, and that there is no occasion for it. In operating the engine no vacuum was produced or utilized as claimed. Mr. Knight says in another part of his report: “I had been promised a sample of the “vapor,” and while the engine was running, upon the 4th of November, I filled the bottle from the exhaust pipe. Mr. Keely had prepared a strong iron vessel with a stop-cock, which he then charged with “vapor” under a pressure which he emphatically declared as 1,200 pounds to the square inch, that being the reading of? the gauge on the sphere. Instead of taking it from the multiplication, however, or even from the brass sphere to which the gauge was attached, he led a tube from the sphere to a receiver attached to his so-called “vaporic” gun, a machine to which our attention had not before been directed, and which we had no opportunity to examine, and in this indirect way charged the tube. These samples of Mr. Keely’s “vapor” were at once submitted to C. DM. Cresson, M. D., the well-known chemist, for a careful analysis. By his report it was seen that the "so-called vapor” is merely atmospheric air, and that ?the pressure in the tube was only 225 pounds instead of the 1,200 pounds claimed.” In conclusion, Mr. Knight drew the following conclusions: First, that the machine called the “multiplicator,” with its attachments, including the so-called “reacting device,” are not capable of producing the effects claimed, and that their enormous strength is entirely unnecessary in sustaining the pressure to which they are subjected, but are rather calculated to astonish and mislead those who witness his experiments. Second—That the extreme high pressure claimed was not produced, probably in no case exceeding 500? pounds per square inch, and that the readings of the gauges and weighted lever apparatus were incorrect. Third—That the so-called vacuum was not produced by the condensation or absorption of the alleged vapor, but by mechanical means such as a previously exhausted chamber or its equivalents. Fourth—The substance used and claimed by Mr. Keely to be a new vapor of his own discovery, is simply atmospheric air which had been previously compressed and stored up in the various hollow spheres and other chambers of the apparatus in the intervals between the experiments. As might be expected, Mr. Keely is angry at these revelations, and the stockholders who have expended a million of? dollars are astonished. Keely proposes to give two public exhibitions a week with the motor in an endeavor to demonstrate that it is not a fraud.?? [Published: March 29, 1878? Copyright © The New York Times]
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