Wednesday, August 31, 2016
''The Age of Aerostatics'' Part 2 Page 2
''The Age of Aerostatics'' Part 2 Page 2
Some sixteen years after Cavendish dis-covered his new gas, Joseph and Jacques Montgol-fer, French ornithoptists were fasci-nated by watching smoke travel up from the fireplace through the chimney. They conceived the idea of making a smoke cloud which would fly in the air. They took a lightweight bag, filled it with smoke and watched it float through the air. After numerous experiments, they made a large linen bag, about 110 feet in circumference. At Annonay, in late 1783 they had the bag suspended over a fire of wool and order to fill with smoke. The smoke-filled bag rose almost 6,000 feet into the air and stayed afloat for 10 minutes. It fell to earth, as the heated gas inside the bag cooled, landing a couple of miles away. A man-made object had actually flown. With the French Royal Academy of Sciences, the brothers built a larger balloon, 41 feet in diameter.
The Age of Aerostatics
''The Age of Aerostatics'' Part 1 Page 1
In 1643 Evangelista torricelli demonstrated that the earth's atmosphere is more than just empty space. With his barometer he proved that the asmosphere has weight and density just like any gas. This discovery was the beginning of science of aerostatics.Aerostatics (aeri-STAT-ics) is the study of how an object is supported in the air by buoy-ancy; that is its ability to float in air as a boat floats on water. A milestone in this new science was reached ten years before the Declaration of Independence. Henry Cavendish, an English scientist, mixed iron, tin and zinc shavings with oil of vitriol and discovered a new gas which was lighter than air. Cavendish's ''inflammable air'' was later named ''hydrogen'' by the French chemist, Lavoisier.