Maurice Lemaître (mechanical engineer)

Maurice Lemaître (Maurice Édouard Jean Joseph Ghislain Lemaître; born Charleroi, 6 July 1898; died Etterbeek 25 December 1974) was a Belgian mechanical engineer who developed a steam locomotive exhaust system first used by the Nord-Belge railway company, a subsidiary of the French-owned Chemins de Fer du Nord.[1]

The Lemaître exhaust (échappement Lemaître) – which featured a blastpipe with five nozzles in a circular pattern exhausting up a large-diameter chimney, plus a variable-area nozzle exhausting up the centre – produced an efficiency gain of around 10%.[2]

The design was later improved by the Argentine engineer Livio Dante Porta, who devised the Lempor (a portmanteau of Lemaître and Porta) and later the Lemprex exhaust systems.

References

  1. ^ La locomotive actuelle Émile Devernay · 1948- Page 79 "... les anciens échappements à cône mobile du Nord par un nouvel échappement dû à un ingénieur du Nord belge , M. LEMAITRE . L'échappement se compose d'un tronc de cône en tôle placé au – dessus de la tête d'échappement "
  2. ^ "Continental engineers". steamindex. 7 June 2018. Lemaître, Maurice.


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