QUEER THINGS THAT MAY HAPPEN WHEN WE PUT
THE SUN TO WORK
Solar Stoves and
House-Heaters
Already in Use Point to Amazing Potentialities
of New Engine of
/
Dr. Charles G. Abbot ^ /
For Which Nature
Supplies Power
✓
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In the Home Elec
tric Ranges, Toast
ers, Curling Irons,
Water Heaters,
Radiators and
Even Towel Driers
Will Be “Fed” with
Heat Converted
from Sun Rays.
HIGHLY \ /
POLISH ED
i SHEET \ /
AMETAL V"
JyreflectorsV
175 POUNDS )
STEAM PRESSURE
H.P.
STEAM
ENGINE:
FIRE TUBE BOILER
DYNAMO FOR ]
.CONVERTING \
SOLAR HEAT \
INTO ELECTRICAL*
POWER,AND FOR
I
1 COOKING,REFRIGERATION, ETC.
LIGHT
"Bottled Sunlight” Be
fleeted from a Set of Ke
fracting Prism* Sur
rounding a Small Elec
tric Light Bulb Deriving
Its Current at Night
rrom a Storage Battery
Recharged by the Sun.
]Lf Y new solar engine, which gets
all its power from the sun, may
help the world to make the coming
transition from the use of coal and
oil, which some day will be rare
luxuries.
When the supplies of coal and oil
have been exhausted, water-power
will be the only other widely used
source of energy so far as is known
today.
But if the inexhaustible energy
of the sun’s rays Is called upon,
the studies I have made may lead
to an economic solution.
My present sun-power machine
may seem crude a century hence,
but it may help the world to make
the transition, without much sacri
fice.
In the meantime there are many
applications to which sunpower may
be put.
By Lou Wedemar
V
RAYS of the Sun have been har
nessed in one way or another by
man ever since it was discovered,
hundreds of thousands of years ago,
that radiations from a shiny surface
could be made to start a lire. But
only now, after centuries of worship
of the Sun, and a comparatively few
years of scientific investigation of so
lar emanations, has mankind been able
to develop ways to draw upon the
biggest powerhouse in Creation at will
for inexpensive energy, as convenient
ly as it dams rivers or burns coal for
power.
And having, at last, been able to find
methods of tapping the supreme pow
erhouse, scientists and engineers now
loot: forward to the use of sunpovu-r
in generating electricity for thousands
of uses not even guessed today.
Among the concrete instances of the
use of sunpovver which suggest future
possibilities are Florida's sunpower
machines which heat water to provide
warmth in apartment houses after sun
down, and California’s sunpower ma
chines, used for cooking' hot-dogs and
toasting rolls at roadside stands. In
both cases there is not a cent expend
ed for fuel. Some other applications
%
Below, the Solar Heater But to Work
in a California Roadside “Rest," Toast
ing Hamburgers and Hot Dogs. Right,
This Small Solar Motor of Four Photo
electric Cells Creates Suflleicnt Energy
to Operate a Motor Rated at Four Ten
Millionths of One Horse-Power.
HEAT
Ur. C. C. Abbot, at Right, Photographed with His Solar Heater, Which Harnesses the Sun’s Ravs and
Makes Them Operate the One-Half Horse-Power Steam Engine Shown Above the Top Reflector.
of suupower arc graphically illustrated
in this page.
Star of the infant sunpower indus
try is a learned scientist. Dr. Charles
G. Abbot of the Smithsonian Institu
tion. For many years he has studied
the sun and the action of its rays,
until he knows perhaps more about
l hem tlAn any other living man.
Dr. Abbot calculates that the
amount of sunlight falling in one day,
on an area of one square yard, would
provide one full horsepower of energy
if it could be utilized. Sunpower could
be made to supply electricity, water
and air-conditioning to make healthful
desert land a good place to live.
An amazing: new machine, which Dr.
Abbot calls a “solar engine,” is actual
ly in experimental use today. With it
Dr. Abbot solved the problem of trans
muting sunlight into electrical energy
which can be stored, the biggest stum
bling-block of earlier experimenters.
The solar engine consists of large,
shiny aluminum mirrors, which con
centrate the sunlight on a pyrex glass
tube, much as a magnifying glass does
in a high school physics test. And in
the same way as the magnifying glass
will make the sunlight set fire to paper
or cloth, the aluminum mirrors pro
vide intense heat in the pyrex tubes.
These tubes are full of a black
liquid, which has a capacity for re
taining heat. This liquid runs into a
boiler, heating water in the boiler un
til it turn^ to steam. The steam runs
a steam engine, which in turn runs a
dynamo. And the dynamo provides
electricity for power.
The quality of power provided by
the solar engine is just the same as if
coal were used to heat the boiler—and
the operating cost of the sunpower
machine is figured by Dr. Abbot to be
about the same as it would be for
steampower houses using fuel costing
$3 a ton.
There is no immediate danger, how
ever, that coal miners will be put out
*1
On the Farm the Sun’s Energy Can Be Put to Work Operating Motors for Milking, Threshing
Mowing, Pumping and Hoisting, in Addition to Providing Illumination at Night
Copyright, 1936. King Features Syndicate, Inc.
A 260-Ton Gearless Passenger Locomotive on
M. and St. P. Railroad, Taking Its Power from an
Overhead Trol
ley Wire. ,
A Working Diagram of Dr. Abbot’s
Solar Heater, Recently Demonstrated
Before a Group of Distinguished Sci
entists and Engineers at Washington,
D. C. The .Abbot Solar Engine Trans
forms Heat from the Rays of the Sun
into Electric Energy.
of work by the solar engine. In fact,
there is no ground for wild prophecy
that solar-controlled dynamos will
make either water and steam generat
ing plants obsolete in the near future.
In working on sunpower, Dr. Abbot
is looking far into the future rather
than to present needs. He believes that
some day the world's coal reserves
will be exhausted, and oil, which also
is used for heat and power, will be un
available. When that day comes—pos
sibly hundreds of years from now
mankind must turn to the*sun, the
winds and the tides for assistance.
And his experiments seem to jus
tify the assertion that some day the
sun will heat and light the world, day
and rfight, summer and winter.
«
a»iwwwwiwBif«
Student# at the California Institute of Technology' Inspecting a New Type of Sun
Furnace Designed by One of Their Number.