• February 15, 1918.

THE COLLIERY GUARDIAN.

337

SOUTH WALES MINING TIMBER TRADE.

Imports of foreign mining timber have been upon a fair
scale during the past few days. No supplies have been
received from Scandinavia, but it is understood that at
least one firm is arranging for Spanish timber. As this
firm has not participated in the agreement between the
Controller of Import Restrictions and importers, whereby
only a limited quantity is allowed to be imported, it is
expected that an excess quantity will be granted. The
question arises as to where the shipping tonnage will come
from. It is understood that arrangements will be made
for the carriage of the wood by one firm in Spanish vessels.
Prices are at the maximum levels. The total quantity of
mining timber imported amounted to 7,350 loads, of which
3,456 loads were taken by the Admiralty Pitwood Com-
mittee, while the balance was received by approved
importers. The following shows the actual quantities
imported:—

Cardiff (Barry and Penarth) :—

Date.  Feb. 4		Consignee.  Vyvyan Kelly and Co	  E. Marcesche and Co		Loads.  .... 1,099  .... 240
	4		
	4	Morgan and Cadogan		....	120
99	4	E. Marcesche and Co		....	240
	4	Grant Hayward and Co		40
99	4	Budd and Co		....	175
99	4	Budd and Co		....	120
99	5	A. Bromage and Co		.... 1,200
99	7	Lysberg Limited		.... 2,160
99	7	Lysberg Limited		.... 1,200
	7	Lysberg Limited		96
99	7	Mathew Thompson		....	120
99	8	Morgan and Cadogan		.... 540
		Total		.... 7,350

Newport, Swansea and Port Talbot:—Nil.

The Passing of the Merchant?

Having regard to the recent trend of events in the South
Wales pitwood trade, the question is now being seriously
discussed as to whether the future will witness the aboli-
tion of the merchant. As in other trades, under war con-
ditions the scope of importers, merchants, and middlemen
has been considerably narrowed. The Government grouped
trades and appointed companies and associations to carry
out what at one time was done by a large number of
middlemen. Speculation in commodities has been ruth-
lessly stamped out under a system of fixed prices. The
fixing of prices and of freight rates rendered the business
of merchants much less onerous, and in many cases the
service of the merchant or middleman is now merely
clerical, and calls for no astute knowledge of market con-
ditions. In the pitwood trade, prices have been fixed,
freight rates regulated, and supplies are allocated at the
dictates of an Allocation Committee instituted by the
Government. In South Wales, an association was formed
to supply foreign mining timber to collieries direct, such
association working on what might be termed a co-opera-
tive basis. This association receives five-eighths of the
total quantity of foreign mining timber allowed to be
imported. Another association was formed during the war
by the South Wales colliery proprietors to deal with the
home-grown wood. These associations have whittled down
the business of merchants to an extremely sharp extent.
The importers and merchants combined to uphold their
rights, but unfortunately there is not that cohesion that
one might have expected. For one or two have offered
to sell wood at a commission of 6d. per ton, and this pro-
duced bickerings. It would not be surprising if the whole
of the foreign pitwood trade were taken over and worked
during the war upon out-of-pocket expenses by a firm
appointed by the Government.

Home-Grown Wood.

Deliveries of home-grown wood to the collieries continue
upon a fair scale, although there are said to be some
thousands of tons lying about the woods awaiting trans-
port. This wood, by exposure, is deteriorating, and when
utilised in collieries does not possess the same strength as
dry timber. There have been a few instances of crushing
of home-grown wood in the mines, in all probability due
to the utilisation of timber which has been exposed for
months. Irish growers bitterly complain of the fact that
they are penalised as against the French wood imported.
Foreign timber is quoted at 65s. ex ship, while Irish wood
is 65s. delivered to collieries, and the cost of delivering to
collieries varies so widely as to make all the difference
between profit and loss on the transaction at the maximum
selling prices.

THE TIM-PLATE TRADE.

Liverpool.

A basis of 31s. 9d. net f.o.t. at works for coke tin-plates
is now about the official maximum, and makers generally
are adhering to this figure, slight concessions being made
in exceptional cases only. Business is very dull so far as
merchants are concerned. Wasters are in good demand for
28 x 20 lights and full weights, but odd sizes are not
moving very quickly, owing mainly to the difficulty in
obtaining permits. Terne-plates are slow of sale, although
makers are willing to “ cut” the price a good deal for a
favourable specification.

At the next meeting of the Institution of Petroleum
Technologists, on February 19, at 8 p.m., at the house of
the Royal Society of Arts, Adelphi, W.C., a paper will be
read entitled “ A New British Oil Industry,” by Mr. E. H.
Cunningham Craig, Dr. F. Moilwo Perkin, Mr. A. G. V.
Berry, and Dr. A. E. Dunstan. The president of the insti-
tution (Dr. Charles Greenway) will occupy the chair.

Chemistry Research Scholarship.—Messrs. Simon-Carves
Limited have founded in the University of Manchester a
research scholarship in chemistry of the annual value of
£100. It will be tenable for one year in the first instance,
but the holder will be eligible for election for a second year.
The object of the scholarship is to enable graduates and
others to obtain training in research, and so become better
qualified to enter industry.

French Coal Output in 1917. — The Revue Parisienne
states that for the whole of 1917 the imports fell to
18,470,000 tons, or 1,500,000 tons less than in 1915, but the
results of the extraction compensated for this diminution.
Last year the output of the French collieries was
28,960,000 tons, or 7,000,000 tons more than in 1915. This
figure shows an increase of extraction of 35 per cent, on
1916, and 45 per cent, on 1915. Out of the total, and in
spite of the rarefaction of the import coal, the quantities
placed at. the disposal of the national consumption in 1917
show an increase of 11 per cent, on 1916 and 19 per cent,
on 1915. They reached 47,380,000 tons, and the deficit
compared with normal consumption is brought from 40 per
cent, to 26 per cent.

FUEL ECONOMY IN ENGINEERING.

Mr. P. N. Everett, A.M.I.C.E., designer in the
internal combustion engine department of Sir W. G.
Armstrong, Whitworth and Company Limited,
Elswick, delivered an address on ‘ ‘ The Internal Com-
bustion Engine ” to the members of the Newcastle and
district section of the Association of Engineering and
Shipbuilding Draughtsmen at Newcastle on Feb. 8.
He made a special point of the economy resulting from
the use of internal combustion engines.

If the fuel was in liquid or gaseous form, the intro-
duction into the working cylinder was a compara-
tively simple operation. In the case of solid fuel,
although experimental engines had been made to burn
solid coal in the cylinder direct, yet it was not con-
sidered to be a practical proposition, nor was it scien-
tifically sound, so the coal was first converted into gas
in a producer and the gas burnt in the engine cylinder.
That was a thoroughly scientific and efficient method
of using our stores of fuel, but the present method of
burning coal in a furnace under a boiler was a most
crude, elementary, and barbarous method, and posi-
tively criminal in an island country like ours.
Scientists estimated our reserves at less than 500 years
at the pre-war rate of consumption. The Census of
Production of 1907 estimated the average consumption
of coal for power at 5 lb. per horse-power hour, and
that figure, if gas engines were adopted, could pro-
bably be reduced to about 1J lb., with a corresponding
increase in the life of the fuel reserve. The time
would come no doubt when we should adopt the scheme
put forward by the late Sir William Ramsay, some six
or seven years ago, of mining the coal beds by gasify-
ing them in situ. Meanwhile, we must endeavour to
obtain the less ambitious, but more practical, scheme
of mining the coal, gasifying it at the pit mouth, and
distributing the power either in gas mains or in high-
tension cables after converting it into electrical power.
To take full advantage of the enormous national
wealth in our coal fields, the coal must be scientifically
handled in such a way that, whilst the energy was
made available for the engineer, the valuable so-called
by-products must be available for the chemist. Again,
the over-all thermal efficiency of the internal combus-
tion engine, reckoned on fuel used to useful work
done, showed a material improvement, and any
machine which could show an improvement must finally
assert itself, even if at present there were mechanical
and metallurgical difficulties, or even if financiers arti-
ficially inflated the price of the most suitable fuel to
such an extent that the gain in thermal efficiency was
over-balanced.

The question of fuel was one of paramount import-
ance at present. For years, commissions and com-
mittees had been issuing warnings, all of which
appeared to fall on deaf ears. The three great by-pro-
ducts which could be obtained from coal scientifically
handled were tar, benzol, and sulphate of ammonia.
Our barbarous methods of consuming our annual
amount of 280 million tons of coal resulted in a loss
of 2,000 million gallons of tar suitable for naval pur-
poses, 300 million gallons of benzol for motor vehicles,
and three million tons of sulphate of ammonia—the
demand for which had doubled in amount in the past
10 years.

He gave the following table of thermal efficiencies
on b.h.p. : —

Per cent.

(1) Average triple expansion set, • assuming 1-5 lb.
of average coal per indicated horse-power
hour, and 90 per cent, mechanical effici-

ency of engine .......................... 11-4

(2)	High-class overtype engine and boiler, fitted

with superheater. Consumption, 1*21 lb.
coal per b.h.p. hour ..................... 15

(3)	Large gas plants, where by-products are

abstracted and sold. About 1-20 lb. per
b.h.p. hour of bituminous slack ......... 18-5

(4)	Suction gas producer, too small for recovery of

by-products. About 0-60 lb. anthracite
per b.h.p. hour ......................... 28-3

(5)	Low compression two-cycle oil engine, 0-50 lb.

per b.h.p. hour ......................... 26-4

(6)	Four-cycle Diesel oil engine, 0-40 lb. per

b.h.p. hour ............................. 33-5

For the above figures to be continuously main-

tained in practice, the whole plant must be properly
handled and supervised. When considering the ques-
tion of fuel economy, it should be remembered that
the present arrangements permitted of power being
generated in little units, by hopelessly inefficient gear,
which, in any other country, would long since have
been relegated to the scrap heap. These were the
“heat engines” which brought the average figure for
consumption of coal on power purposes in this country
up to the figure of 51b. per b.h.p. hour.

He showed a slide of an ordinary suction gas pro-
ducer for the generation of gas from coal or other solid
fuel, and stated that he knew of one which was work-
ing on fish refuse. Very large plants operated on the
Mond system, in which bituminous slack was used. Air
and a large quantity of low-pressure steam (about 2|
tons per ton of slack) were forced through the glow-
ing fuel. The steam kept the temperature of combus-
tion low enough to allow of the recovery of the valu-
able by-products. The South Staffordshire Mond Gas
Company was an example of a large central depot
where gas was generated on an economical basis, which
allowed for the recovery of by-products, the gas being
distributed throughout the district in large pipes. The
plant was put to work in 1905, and consisted of eight
producers 10 ft. in diameter, each of a capacity of 20
tons of coal per 24 hours, together with the necessary
tar plant and sulphate of ammonia plant. The
average output was about 140,000 cu. ft. of gas of a
calorific power of 150 British thermal units per cubic
foot, 801b. of sulphate of ammonia, and 1901b. of tar
per ton of coal. The gas was distributed at 5 lb. per
square inch pressure through about 30 miles of pipe.
A large number of engines were supplied, and the
average consumption was about 70 cu. ft. per b.h.p.
hour. A very promising feature of the plant was that
it would handle very poor fuels, even those containing

up to 40 per cent, of ash. When they considered that
from 20 to 35 per cent, of our fuel reserves were being
left in the mines at present because there was no
market for the low-grade fuel, it would be obvious that
there was another opportunity of increasing the useful
life of our fuel reserves. About 25 to 30 horse-power
was generated.per square foot of grate area, as against
12 horse-power for the marine boiler.

MANCHESTER GEOLOGICAL AND
MINING SOCIETY.

A meeting of the members of the Manchester
Geological and Mining Society was held on Tuesday
last, Mr. W. Pickup (president) in the chair.

The President moved that Sir Henry Hall, I.S.O.,
be elected an honorary member. He said Sir Henry
Hall joined the society in 1881, and was president on
two occasions—in 1889-90 and 1902-3. He had con-
tributed numerous communications, but was perhaps
best known as H.M. chief inspector of ijiines for one
of the divisions of Lancashire during a long period.
He did valuable work in connection with the researches
into coal dust as a dangerous element in mines. For
the experiments he conducted, and the remedial
measures he suggested, and for his eminent services
in other respects, the mining community owed him a
debt of gratitude.

Mr. J. B. Harrison said, having been a member of
the council with Sir Henry Hall, he could from his
own experience fully bear out the chairman’s testi-
mony to the valuable nature of the work; and he
seconded the resolution with pleasure.

The resolution was carried unanimously.

Coal Economy.

Mr. W. H. Casmey, M.S.W.I.E., read a paper on
“ Coal Economy from a National Standpoint.” (See
page 338.)

Discussion.

The Chairman said 50 million tons of coal wasted
annually was an enormous figure, and if the paper
resulted in the saving of only a portion, Mr. Casmey
would be entitled to the gratitude of the whole com-
munity. The use of coal might tend more and more
in the direction of carbonisation, securing the valuable
by-products, and generating electricity at large dis-
trict power stations, where every economy could be
practised. In the meantime, the improvements sug-
gested in the paper could be brought into operation
at once, and the present low boiler efficiency of 62 per
cent, very materially improved. The suggested divi-
sion wall along the bottom flue of the boiler, and the
dust cavities around to prevent leakage, were good.
The proportioning of the grate area to double the
outlet area of the internal flues was most important,
and the examples of improved results were very con-
clusive. Mr. Casmey had laid down simple principles
by which substantial economies in the use of coal could
be effected with little expense. He moved a hearty
vote of thanks to Mr. Casmey.

Mr. Harrison seconded the motion, which was car-
ried unanimously.

Mr. Bramwell asked whether, with an increased
draught, it was possible to burn inferior coal, say,
containing 50 per cent, of refuse or ash, and get the
same amount of steam, or were the experiments made
with a better quality of coal? Were any experiments
made as to the height of the bridge?

Mr. Casmey replied that in one case the slurry from
a coal washery was mixed with the sweepings from
coke ovens, and he was putting down a battery of eight
boilers to use that fuel only. The decision whether
they should employ forced draught or steam jets was
still in abeyance, but the boilers would have to raise
nearly 1,000 gals, of water each. .With reference to
the bridge, the height that he invariably took from the
top of the bridge to the crown plate was about 15 in.
He made the bridge as low as possible.

Mr. H. R. Webster asked whether the remarks as
to the proportionate area of the grate to the outlet,
2 to 1, were confined to the Lancashire boiler or
applied to other types? Had Mr. Casmey used scien-
tific instruments for the purpose of arriving at his
figures or was it simply by rule of thumb?

Mr. Casmey stated that the proportion of 2 to 1
was a hard and fast line. There were several types of
boilers besides the Lancashire—he was particularly
interested in the Yorkshire—but he took as his basis
the standard boiler of the district. He had used a
pyrometer, a draught gauge and a CO2 indicator. No
one could test a boiler unless he had those instruments.

The Chairman said the author advocated a large
size bottom flue. Was that so as to slow down the
draught and enable the boiler to keep up the heat
better ? Did the reduction of the area at the back end
of the flue cause more intense furnace temperature?
Was there any danger of overdoing that and getting
the furnace temperature too high? He asked that
question because he had known cases of Lancashire
mill boilers had been used with forced draught. There
was scale on the flues and the increasing of the heat
in the furnace tended to bring the furnace crown down.
He wondered whether there was any danger of getting
the heat too high in the furnace.

Mr. Casmey answered the first two questions in the
affirmative. He did not think there was any chance
of raising the temperature too high so long as the
boiler was clean, because the transmission of heat
through the plate was so rapid. He had mentioned
that the transmission of heat through boiler scale was
only two-thirds of the transmission through a clean
plate.

Mr. Bramwell remarked that after two new boilers
had been in a pit a few months the furnaces collapsed.
They were perfectly clean, there was not an atom of
scale, and he could only conjecture that it was due to
intense heat. The plate got red hot and collapsed.
There was just a fine powder on the top of the flue.