AUTOMATIC STOKING.
The labour of feeding the retorts with coal and removing the coke is exceedingly severe. In the illustration on p. 400 (made from a very fine photograph taken by Mr. F. Marsh of Clifton) we see a man engaged in "drawing" the retorts through the iron doors at their outer ends. Automatic machinery is now used in large gasworks for both operations. One of the most ingenious stokers is the De Brouwer, shown at work in Fig. 198. The machine is suspended from an overhead trolley running on rails along the face of the retorts. Coal falls into a funnel at the top of the telescopic pipe P from hoppers in the story above, which have openings, H H, controlled by shutters. The coal as it falls is caught by a rubber belt working round part of the circumference of the large wheel W and a number of pulleys, and is shot into the mouth of the retort. The operator is seen pulling the handle which opens the shutter of the hopper above the feed-tube, and switching on the 4 h.p. electric motor which drives the belt and moves the machine about. One of these feeders will charge a retort 20 feet long in twenty-two seconds.