80
it within a few feet.
CHANGING SPEED HOURS TO SECONDS.--As one- sixtieth of the speed per minute will represent the rate of movement per second, it is a comparatively easy matter to convert the time from speed in miles per hour to fraction of a mile traveled in a second, by merely taking one-half of the speed in miles, and adding it, which will very nearly express the true number of feet.
As examples, take the following: If the wind is traveling 20 miles an hour, it is easy to take one-half of 20, which is 10, and add it to 20, making 30, as the number of feet per second. If the wind travels 50 miles per hour, add 25, making 75, as the speed per second.
The correct speed per second of a wind traveling 20 miles an hour is a little over 29 feet. At 50 miles per hour, the correct figure is 73 1/3 feet, which show that the figures under this rule are within about one per cent. of being correct.
With the table before you it will be an easy matter, by observing the air pressure indicator, to determine the proper speed for the anemometer. Suppose it shows a pressure of two pounds, which will indicate a speed of twenty miles an hour. You have thus a fixed point to start from.
PRESSURE AS THE SQUARE OF THE SPEED.--Now it must not be assumed that if the pressure at twenty miles an hour is two pounds, that forty miles an hour it is four pounds. The pressure is as the square of the speed. This may be explained as follows: As the speed of the wind increases, it has a more effective push against an object than its rate of speed indicates, and this is most simply expressed by saying that each time the speed is doubled the pressure is four times greater.
As an example of this, let us take a speed of ten miles an hour, which means a pressure of one- half pound. Double this speed, and we have 20 miles. Multiplying one-half pound by 4, the result is 2 pounds. Again, double 20, which means 40 miles, and multiplying 2 by 4, the result is 8
