Wedgewood's Pyrometer

Name/Title

Wedgewood's Pyrometer

Entry/Object ID

2013.3.90

Description

Description from L.A. Brown's 1959 catalog: "A thermometer designed to measure the temperatures of furnaces from about 1000 to 3000° F. This is, of course, above the range of mercurial thermometers. In use this pyrometer depends upon the degree of shrinkage of a small cylinder of pottery clay in the presence of heat. The temperature is determined by noting the place on the scaled trough of the thermometer where the cylinder of clay will wedge after having been subjected to the heat of the furnace. A good account of this instrument is given by G. Gregory (A Dictionary of Arts & Sciences, Phila., 1816). The pyrometer was brought for thirty francs from Pixii, Paris, in 1839."

Collection

Moosnick Museum - Scientific Apparatus