Phillip&rsquos Maximum Thermometer


A maximum thermometer, better perhaps in its action than Rutherford’s, has been suggested by Professor John Phillips, of Oxford. A small portion of air is introduced into an ordinary thermometer, so as to cut off about half an inch of the mercurial thread near its end in the tube. This forms a maximum thermometer, when the stem is arranged horizontally. The isolated portion is pushed forward by expansion, and is left in this position when the mercury contracts. The end remote from t
e bulb shows on the scale the maximum temperature.



When made with a capillary tube so fine that the attraction arising from capillarity overcomes the force of gravity, and prevents the mercury falling to the end of the tube when the instrument is inverted, it forms a very serviceable thermometer, quite portable and suitable for use on board ship. In such a tube a smart shake from a swing of the hand is required to bring the detached portion back to the column, so as to set the instrument for future observation; no ordinary motion will move it. When the thermometer has not this peculiarity, the mercury will flow to the end, if held bulb downward; and in this state it is not at all a satisfactory instrument, as the air is likely to be displaced, and a great deal of tact is requisite to again get it to divide the column suitably. It has been found in practice that the air bubble at different temperatures assumes different lengths, and if very small it disappears in a few years by oxidation and by diffusion with the mercury, so that the instrument becomes defective and uncertain in action,—results which led to the construction of the self-registering mercurial maximum thermometer, invented and patented by Messrs. Negretti and Zambra. It has been before the public about twelve years; we may therefore, now, safely speak of its merits.








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