All About Engines

48 All About Engines smooth matters over. He was a man of business habits, of charming manners, and ready address. He could do what was quite impossible to Watt, and had Watt searched the country from end to end it is doubtful whether he could have found a man better fitted in all respects to co-operate with him. The trouble with the Cornishmen was not the only one which had to be faced. The Soho works had extended very rapidly, and Boulton had many irons in the fire. Financial difficulties arose, money had to be borrowed, and there were times when bank- ruptcy seemed to be the inevitable end. But they weathered the storm and gradually emerged from their difficulties to enjoy the fruits of their labours. In Boulton’s words, they set out “ to make steam engines for the world,” and they made them. Said he on one occasion, "The country is steam engine mad”; and from that day to this the madness has never ceased. The earlier Watt cylinders—those constructed up to 1778—were of the type shown in Fig. 17. The cylinder, it will be observed, was open at the top end, and totally enclosed in an outer vessel filled with steam. Starting with the piston at the top of its stroke, the steam pressed it down until it reached the lowest point. The steam valve then closed, the equilibrium valve opened and, by admit- ting steam to the lower half of the cylinder, made the pressures above and below the piston equal. The piston was then drawn up by the weight on the pump rod at the other end of the beam. Immedi- ately it reached the top the valve leading to the