Charles Parsons (engineer)
Sir Charles Algernon Parsons OM KCB (born June 13, 1854 in London , † February 11, 1931 on board the Duchess of Richmond in Kingston Harbor , Jamaica ) was a British mechanical engineer.
Parsons was the youngest of six sons of the 3rd Earl of Rosse , President of the Royal Society, who was known in science for constructing the 6-foot reflecting telescope on the family home in Birr Castle , Ireland . Parsons spent most of his childhood there. His mother, a highly educated woman and also particularly interested in scientific questions, had a great influence on the son's development. Charles Parsons never attended a public school in his youth, but received his knowledge from tutors who were trained in mathematics and science. Among other things, he was a student of the astronomer Sir Robert Stawell Ball . In 1871 he entered Trinity College in Dublin and two years later was an undergraduate at St John's College , Cambridge , where he received the degree of Bachelor of Arts in 1877 .
From Cambridge he went to the Elswick works of Armstrong in Newcastle upon Tyne . After leaving Elswick in 1881, he came into contact with Sir James Kitson in Leeds and two years later joined Clarke, Chapman and Co. in Gateshead as a junior partner. In the following year, 1884, he patented his reaction steam turbine , improving and using it for the rest of his life.
After separating from Clarke, Chapman and Co. in 1889 and having to cede his patents for his previous designs, he founded CA Parsons & Co in Heaton near Newcastle upon Tyne, where he developed steam turbines for stationary operation. In 1894 he also founded the Marine Steam Turbine Company in Wallsend-on-Tyne , which built steam turbines for ships. Its basic idea was the steam to turbines parallel wave by a plurality of pairs of blades and vanes to flow to make and very gradually on the rotor blades, the thermal energy of water vapor in a rotational movement to implement. From the start, the speed of its turbine was in a range that could be converted into electricity by a generator without a gearbox . The combination of a turbine that is directly connected to the generator by a shaft is known today as a turbo set . Its turbines as an early design of a turbine set were used for the first time in the Forth Banks Power Station in Newcastle upon Tyne, the design subsequently prevailed in various power stations and steam power plants .
Another invention by Charles Parsons was the idea of letting the steam flow in the middle and relaxing it in both directions. With this arrangement, the forces in the axial direction which are caused by the steam pressure on the turbine blades and which load on the turbine bearings are canceled out. Its steam turbine is now called the Parsons turbine .
Parsons was the first to build a steam turbine powered ship, the Turbinia , in 1894 . After many attempts, she finally reached a speed of 34.5 knots, more than 4 knots faster than any other ship before, making it the fastest watercraft of its time. He made his ship known with a bang in 1897, at a large naval parade in honor of Queen Victoria at Spithead near Portsmouth . He easily detached all ships that wanted to chase and drive him away. The matter paid off for him, because the next year he was commissioned to build a destroyer that would be powered by its turbines, the HMS Viper . She then reached up to 36 knots, an unimaginable speed for that time. The Turbinia is now in a museum in Newcastle upon Tyne, England.
In addition to his main interest in the development of steam turbines, he still found time to deal with other scientific and mechanical problems. For example the “Auretophon”, a device that amplifies the tones of instruments by supplying compressed air. Cellist Auguste van Biene tested this for its usefulness and sound effect at a concert in the Queen's Hall in the summer of 1909 . In his later life he was known for his interest in the construction of large telescopes.
In 1898 he was elected a member of the Royal Society , in 1925 in the National Academy of Sciences . In 1904 he was awarded the Grashof Memorial Medal from the Association of German Engineers . In 1911 Parsons was knighted and received the Order of Merit in 1927 . Shortly before his death, he was accepted as a corresponding member of the then Soviet Academy of Sciences .
His funeral service took place on March 3, 1931 at Westminster Abbey .
Web links
- Frank Patalong: Speedboat revolution: "Turbinia" The steam hammer . In: one day . on Spiegel Online recalled from February 18, 2013 on February 18, 2013
Individual evidence
- ^ RH Parsons: The Early Days of the Power Station Industry . In: The Journal of Economic History . Vol. 2, Series 1. Cambridge University Press, 1942, pp. 107-108 .
- ^ Entry on Parsons, Sir, Charles Algernon (1854-1931), engineer in the Archives of the Royal Society , London
- ^ Foreign members of the Russian Academy of Sciences since 1724. Charles Algernon Parsons. Russian Academy of Sciences, accessed October 13, 2015 .
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Parsons, Charles |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Parsons, Sir Charles Algernon (full name) |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | British mechanical engineer |
| DATE OF BIRTH | June 13, 1854 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | London |
| DATE OF DEATH | February 11, 1931 |
| Place of death | on board the Duchess of Richmond (ship) , Kingston Harbor , Jamaica |