Watt

JAMES, (wot,) an eminent British engineer and mechanical inventor, B. at Greenock, 1736. He early developed extraordinary talents in practical mechanics, and in 1765 perfected his grand discovery of the condensation of steam by means of an air-tight cylinder, and likewise invented an apparatus to depre the piston of an engine by steam instead of atmospheric pre ure. For some years he occupied himself in the surveying and engineering of various public works in Scotland, and in 1774 entered into partnership with the Me rs. Boulton of Soho, Birmingham, for the manuf. of steam engines, perfecting numerous and great improvements in their mechanism-among others the regulator by centrifugal force, the throttle-valve, the machinery of parallel motion, and the steam-barometer. In 1782 he invented the double-acting engine, and retired from busine in 1800. D. 1819. [s. 953]