Profile Charles Algernon Parsons
Charles Algernon Parsons Portrait
One of the distinct achievements in steam engineering during the latter part of the nineteenth century has been the commercial development of the steam turbine and its application to useful purposes on a comparatively large scale. With this work the name of Charles Algernon Parsons has become inseparably associated, and the Parsons steam turbine has by this time secured a degree of recognition which, less than twenty years ago, would have appeared wholly chimerical.
Born in 1854 at London, the fourth surviving son of the late Earl of Rosse, of Birr Castle, Parsonstown, Ireland, well known as the builder of the telescope which bears his name, Mr. Parsons, after private tuition at home, entered St. Johns College, Cambridge.
In 1874 he became a scholar of St. Johns, and in 1876 graduated eleventh wrangler. It was at college that the idea first came to him that the reciprocating engine was not destined to be the engine of the future, and that the ideal engine must be purely rotating and without reciprocating parts.
In 1877 Mr. Parsons entered the works of Lord Armstrong, as an apprentice, and served with them until 1881, when he joined Messrs. Kitson, of Leeds, remaining with them until 1883. In 1884 he became a partner in the firm of Messrs. Clarke, Chapman & Co., Ltd., of Gateshead-on-Tyne, the name of the firm becoming Messrs. Clarke, Chapman, Parsons & Co. The electrical industry at that time being the latest development of engineering, Mr. Parsons conceived the idea that a high-speed, direct-coupled engine was required to drive the dynamo and that the steam turbine was the engine to do it. This was the impetus which was required, and very shortly the first working steam turbine and dynamo was built, the results in the way of low steam consumption, small size and continuous running showing that the steam turbine was at last to begin to take the place of the reciprocating engine.
Although Mr. Parsons was not actually the first to see the advantage which a rotary engine would have over a reciprocating one, yet his turbine was, from the first, the only one which was practical, and it is due to his untiring energy and perseverance that his invention has at last been recognised as one of the greatest inventions of the century. In 1889 Mr. Parsons severed his connection with Messrs. Clarke, Chapman & Co., Ltd., and started the Heaton Works at Newcastle-on-Tyne, devoting his entire energy to the improvement of the turbine.
It is unnecessary here to enumerate the various changes which the turbine has undergone from the first small one of about 5 H. P., which was shown at the Inventions Exhibition, some years ago, down to those of 1000 K. W. each which are now being turned out. The most recent success of the turbine in its application to the propulsion of ships will be fresh in every one’s mind, the Turbinia having attained the unprecedented speed of 34 knots at the British naval review at Spithead in 1897.
Turbinia Ship Image
The two torpedo-boat destroyers which have been engined by the Parsons Marine Steam Turbine Company, Ltd., of Wallsend, and which are now undergoing their preliminary trials, are expected to steam still faster and to easily attain their guaranteed speed of 35 knots. The application of the turbine to larger boats will follow, and we may expect soon to see Atlantic liners doing 23 to 26 knots as easily as they now do their 20 knots.
Among other inventions to which Mr. Parsons has turned his attention is that of the flying machine; but, up to the present, time has not permitted him to make extended experiments in this direction. A small flying machine was made by him about ten years ago and was probably one of the first examples of a steam engine of extremely light weight, able to lift itself in the air by means of a screw propeller, or, when mounted on aeroplanes, of propelling itself J for considerable distances. The weight of the engine, boiler and fins was only 1 % pounds, and the power developed, horse-power.
Mr. Parsons is managing director of the Newcastle and District Electric Lighting Company and of the Parsons Marine Steam Turbine Company, Ltd., at Wallsend, and also director of the Cambridge and Scarborough Electric Supply companies. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society, president of the Institute of Junior Engineers, and a member of the institutions of Civil Engineers and Electrical Engineers of Great Britain.