The Shuman Sun-Heat Absorber

Abstract

MOST of the experimenters who have attempted to make direct use of the sun's heat for the production of power have adopted the practice of greatly concentrating the sun's rays and focussing them on to a comparatively small and strong boiler generating steam at a fairly high pressure. Mr. Frank Shuman has used a concentration of only two to one, though in the next plant, which will be mate rially different (due to certain recommendations of Prof. C. V. Boys, F.R.S.) from the one herein referred to, the concentration will be three to one. The boilers are lamellar, about a yard square, and only about one-quarter inch thick. They are made of thin tinned copper, painted dull black on the outside, with a number of opposed indentations, the tinning holding the two sheets together where these indentations touch.