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Title: |
1894 &1898 Articles-Welch & Lawson, Vertical Gas Engines |
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Source: |
Gas, Gasoline and Oil Vapor Engines, 1898 pgs 253-255 & Proceedings of the American Gas Institute, V 10 #2, Apr 1894, Appendix pg. 42 |
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Insert Date: |
2/23/2014 7:49:17 PM |
The Lawson Gas and Gasoline Engine
The Lawson engines are built by Welch & Lawson. They are of the four-cycle compression type and of the vertical style. They are built in eight sizes, from ½ to 15 B.H.P. with single cylinders, and of 20 and 30 B.H.P. with double cylinders. The concern also builds gasoline engines for horse-less wagons and carriages. Figs. 177 and 178 represent two styles of the vertical engine. The valves have a positive motion from two sets of reducing-gear, Fig. 177, one of which operates the poppet exhaust valve by a push-rod and cam on the reducing-gear shaft. The gas and air inlets are on the opposite side of the cylinder from the exhaust. The gas valve is a poppet, operated directly by a push-rod from a cam on the reducing-gear shaft, while a piston valve operated by a push-rod from a crank-pin on the reducing-gear governs the air inlet independently of the gas-inlet valve.
By this arrangement the air inlet is opened before the gas inlet is opened, and allows a sweep of pure air to enter at the head of the cylinder, followed by the mixture of gas and air; thus in a measure keeping the explosive mixture of gas and air separate from the products of the previous explosion by injecting it across and next to the cylinder head where the igniter inlet enters the cylinder. The same cycle of operation is made in the engine Fig. 178, by a single set of gearing.
The igniter is of the hot-tube style, entering the side of the cylinder directly under the head. The governor is of the horizontal, centrifugal style, taking its motion through a bevel gear from the reducing-gear shaft, and operates the gas-valve push-rod for a variable gas charge.
The Lawson pumping engines (Fig. 179) are made in two sizes, 1 and 2 B.H.P. These engines are constructed on the same principles as the power engines, only with inverted cylinder and with pump attachments on a single square base. This company is now building kerosene-oil engines of similar pattern as here described.
The Lawson engine seems attractive to the writer as one of those accepted standard machines that satisfactorily do their work, and are regularly made and sold year in and year out, without pretentiousness, but with apparent satisfaction to both makers and the users, as a simple, well-built, good grade engine.
Outside of New York and vicinity it is scarcely known, but in that neighborhood the makers claim since its design by Mr. Samuel Lawson, and introduction in I883, to have put out 1,000 or more, chiefly for confectioner’s use for freezing, for pumping, and kindred semi-domestic powers. In appearance it is more like a conventional small vertical steam engine than any other make of gas engine excepting possibly the “Pacific.” In action it is the Otto cycle, using water jacket, a gear-driven balanced piston valve, an ordinary ball governor for omitting charges, and tube ignition. In size it is made from Z to 15 H. P. and in twin form to 30 H.P. Special pumping forms are a feature. The address is Welch & Lawson, 203 Centre Street, New York. It is actively on the local market. No special description nor figures of efficiency are published as far as I know. |
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1898 Welch & Lawson, Vertical Gas Engine
1898 Welch & Lawson, Air & Gas Valve Gearing
1898 Welch & Lawson, Pumping Gas Engine
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