Baths and wash-houses for the labouring classes.

  • Baly, Price Prichard.
Date:
1852
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Baths and wash-houses for the labouring classes. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    economy in the use of fuel. A careful examination of the modes of drying used in various manufactures in the country, failed to satisfy the Committee with the propriety of following any then known plan, and they had to devise a new plan for themselves, or rather for the country at large, because the Committee felt that the work which they were doing was for the whole community. It is but right that I should state that the Committee are greatly indebted to the scientific acquirements and practical knowledge of their Deputy-Chairman, William Hawes, Esq. for the successful issue of those experiments, and that the system of drying which is now adopted was suggested by that gentleman. The objects to be attained were,— 1. —Rapidity of drying, so that poor women need not, after the com- pletion of their washing, wait long for their clothes to dry. 2. —The greatest economy in the apparatus and in the fuel used. 3. —Separation of the clothes of washers, to prevent theft, and to avoid unpleasant comparisons. The plan of drying generally in use at hospitals, workhouses, and other large drying establishments, such as calico and silk-printing works, consists in placing the articles to be dried in a chamber, through which a current of heated air is either forced by a fan, worked by steam or other power, or drawn in by the difference between the specific gravity of the air in the heated chambers and that of the external atmosphere. When the air is forced in, it is generally previously heated by pass- ing through iron tubes exposed to the direct action of a furnace; but when admitted directly from the external atmosphere, it is heated by heated flues or pipes placed at the bottom of the drying-chamber, the fresh air being admitted through a channel communicating with the under side of the flues or pipes. Neither of these plans was found applicable to Public Baths and Wash-houses, for by neither could a suffi- ciently high temperature, with economy of fuel and rapidity of drying, or the separation of the washers’ linen, be attained, although these condi- tions were absolutely necessary to enable the Committee to supply the poor with the means of washing, drying, and ironing, at the small charge (one penny for the first two hours, and one penny per hour after- wards) which was originally contemplated. The objections to the first plan are, the cost of machinery and of the mechanical power required to drive the air through the pipes where it is F
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