New engine for raising water
Date
13 January 1686
Creator
Unknown, Artist
Object type
Archive reference number
Manuscript page number
p3
Material
Dimensions
height (page): 190mm
width (page): 148mm
width (page): 148mm
Subject
Content object
Description
Denis Papin's design of an engine that circulates water using bellows.
In Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, vol. 15, no. 173 (July 1685), Papin had shown an image of his perpetual fountain as a 'riddle' for others to guess its design. This was a way to claim priority. There were two responses, by W. Tenon and by Salomon Reisel, neither of which Papin claimed to work. At the meeting on 13 January 1686, Papin revealed his design, which was ordered to be registered. The design was printed in Philosophical Transactions, vol. 15, no. 178 (dated December 1685).
In Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, vol. 15, no. 173 (July 1685), Papin had shown an image of his perpetual fountain as a 'riddle' for others to guess its design. This was a way to claim priority. There were two responses, by W. Tenon and by Salomon Reisel, neither of which Papin claimed to work. At the meeting on 13 January 1686, Papin revealed his design, which was ordered to be registered. The design was printed in Philosophical Transactions, vol. 15, no. 178 (dated December 1685).
Transcription
There being already six months since I did first propound a new way to raising water printed since in the Philosophicall transactions of July 1685, and no body having yet unriddled it I believe it would be needless to conceal it any longer, but will rather give a full description of the whole contrivance that the R. S. may be pleased to improve it, and that it may be much use of by those who may have occasion for it.
... There is a pair of bellows like AB hidden in a closet next to the room where the engine stands, and by a small pipe BBB they have communication with a hole bored in the bottom of the great glass tumbler CC so that by opening the bellows we may rarefy the air in the said glass: by the same means the air in the crown DD must be rarefied too, because it hath a free communication with the glass CC through a pipe EE: now the air in the crown DD being expanded and the rock FF being filled partly with water and partly with air, this air by its elasticity pressing upon the water drives it up through the pipe GG into the crown DD: the said pipe passeth in the middle of the factitious corall II and hath a little valve like H fitted to its top to keep either air or water from going down that way; the water being got up into the crown flls down through the corall II into a little receptacle KK soddered under the cover of the rock FF so that the water being pressed in the said receptacle spouts out through the two small pipes LL...
Transcribed by the Making Visible project
... There is a pair of bellows like AB hidden in a closet next to the room where the engine stands, and by a small pipe BBB they have communication with a hole bored in the bottom of the great glass tumbler CC so that by opening the bellows we may rarefy the air in the said glass: by the same means the air in the crown DD must be rarefied too, because it hath a free communication with the glass CC through a pipe EE: now the air in the crown DD being expanded and the rock FF being filled partly with water and partly with air, this air by its elasticity pressing upon the water drives it up through the pipe GG into the crown DD: the said pipe passeth in the middle of the factitious corall II and hath a little valve like H fitted to its top to keep either air or water from going down that way; the water being got up into the crown flls down through the corall II into a little receptacle KK soddered under the cover of the rock FF so that the water being pressed in the said receptacle spouts out through the two small pipes LL...
Transcribed by the Making Visible project
Object history
At the meeting of the Royal Society on 13 January 1686, ‘Dr. Papin read a paper of his, containing an account of the contrivance of his water-engine for circulating water; which was ordered to be registered’ (Birch 4:452). The account is registered at RBO/6/291-92 with the legend but without the image.
Tab. 1, fig, 4: water engine, in Denis Papin, ‘A full description, with the use of the new contrivance for raising water, propounded in the Phil. Trans. No. 173', Phil. Trans., vol. 15, no. 178 (December 1685), pp. 1274-78.
Tab. 1, fig, 4: water engine, in Denis Papin, ‘A full description, with the use of the new contrivance for raising water, propounded in the Phil. Trans. No. 173', Phil. Trans., vol. 15, no. 178 (December 1685), pp. 1274-78.
Related fellows
Denis Papin (1647, French) , Natural philosopher
Associated place