| RefNo | AP/32/7/1 |
| Level | Item |
| Title | Unpublished manuscript, 'On the application of the form of carbon deposited in gas retorts during the destructive distillation of coal as the negative plate in the nitric acid voltaic battery' by Christopher Leefe Dresser |
| Creator | Dresser; Christopher Leefe (fl 1849) |
| Date | 1849 |
| Description | Dresser observes that in the retorts used for the destructive distillation of coal to obtain the carburetted hydrogen gas for the purposes of illumination, after a certain time a deposition of carbonaceous matter takes place, and which at length accumulates to such an extent as to fill up a portion of the retort with solid substance, and to line the whole with a coating varying from the thickness of paper to several inches. After describing several forms in which this substance occurs, and which vary considerably both in density and hardness, Dresser states that he found one of great hardness, very little, if at all, porous, and of a stony fracture, to be best adapted for the negative conductor of his nitric acid battery. The most convenient form for the negative conductor is the prismatic, 1⅛ inch square on the side and about 7 inches long, which is immersed 4 inches in the acid, and used with round porous cells, the zinc cylinder being 3 inches in diameter and 4½ inches high.
Includes one diagram in the text of Dresser's battery.
Subject: Chemistry
Received 27 December 1849. Read 7 March 1850. Communicated by Thomas Bell.
Whilst the Royal Society declined to publish this paper in full, an abstract of the paper was published in volume 5 of Abstracts of the Papers Printed in the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London [later Proceedings of the Royal Society] as 'On the application of carbon deposited in gas retorts as the negative plate in the nitric acid voltaic battery'. |
| Extent | 6p |
| Format | Manuscript |
| PhysicalDescription | Ink and graphite pencil on paper |
| AccessStatus | Open |
| AccessConditions | Not available to view, off site for conservation. Please refer to digital surrogate on Science in the Making. |
| RelatedMaterial | DOI: 10.1098/rspl.1843.0227 |
Fellows associated with this archive
| Code | PersonName | Dates |
| NA7505 | Bell; Thomas (1792 - 1880) | 1792 - 1880 |