16 CURRENT TOPICS. [J. F. I.

Electric Current f rom Wind Rotors. (Compressed Air Maga- zing November I93I . ) Windmills have been doing service for hun- dreds of years; and air turbines have been utilized for various pur- poses for decades. Now comes an effort to adapt the rotor principle in a manner tha t will make it possible to generate electric current on a worthwhile scale. An experimental unit is in course of construc- tion at West Burlington, N. J. ; and it seems tha t a number of public-service companies are financing the undertaking. How far those concerns will go in the erection of other plants will depend upon the results obtained at the one now in hand. The first unit, so it is reported, will involve an out lay of $IOO,OOO, but subse- quently, if all goes well, the unit cost may be reduced to $40,000.

With the plant a t West Burlington meeting the expectations of its inventor, it should generate about I,OOO kw. when operating in a 28-mile wind. We will not at this time make any effort to touch upon the details of the apparatus. The cost already stated plainly indicates tha t the plant is far from a mechanically simple one. In short, it bears no resemblance to the windmills and the air turbines tha t most of us have seen. In the last analysis, the effectiveness of the wind rotor as a source of electricity will, naturally, depend upon the availability of sufficient wind to operate it; and in the absence of trade winds, or of winds of dependable frequency, it is plain that a wind rotor electric plant can be used only as a s tandby for other plants tha t can be made to furnish energy at any time.

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Fastest Electric Car on Philadelphia Road. (Popular Science Monthly, December ~93I.) Wha t is declared to be the fastest electric car in the world has been designed for a thirteen-and-one- half mile suburban railroad between Philadelphia and Norristown, Pa. I t is expected to develop a top speed of between eighty and one hundred miles an hour. Ten of the streamlined aluminum cars will soon be placed in passenger service. The fishlike shape, which reduces wind resistance at more than mile-a-minute speeds, was given hundreds of wind tunnel tests in the Universi ty of Michigan's aeronautical testing laboratory before the final design for actual service was chosen. Each car carries fifty-two passengers.

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