A float chamber is a device for automatically regulating the supply of a liquid to a system. It is most typically found in the carburettor of a normally aspirated internal combustion engine, where it automatically meters the fuel supply to the engine. However, this arrangement is found in many automatic liquid systems, for example the cistern of a toilet could be said to be a type of float chamber.
A float chamber works by allowing liquid within the chamber to lift a float which is linked to a valve which regulates the liquid intake. When the level is low, the float drops and opens the valve, allowing in liquid until the float rises sufficiently to close off the valve again. This is identical in principle to the ballcock valve.
One drawback of the basic type of float chamber described is that it only operates correctly when it is the right way up, so more sophisticated solutions are needed in aircraft.
Famous quotes containing the words float and/or chamber:
“I may be smelly and I may be old,
Rough in my pebbles, reedy in my pools,
But where my fish float by I bless their swimming
And I like the people to bathe in me, especially women.”
—Stevie Smith (1902–1971)
“Where the heart is, there the muses, there the gods sojourn, and not in any geography of fame. Massachusetts, Connecticut River, and Boston Bay, you think paltry places, and the ear loves names of foreign and classic topography. But here we are; and, if we tarry a little, we may come to learn that here is best. See to it, only, that thyself is here;—and art and nature, hope and fate, friends, angels, and the Supreme Being, shall not absent from the chamber where thou sittest.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)