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By W. W. Odell

Engineers interested in the manufactured-gas industry have witnessed p pronounced improvements in gas-generating equipment and marked changes in operating procedure during the past decade. In spite of these changes, however, the trend of development in the near future seems to be doubtful. Uncertainty exists mainly because no one can yet accurately calculate the number of years which will elapse before petroleum products become too expensive for, general use in making gas. Research in this field has been active, and the ultimate results are awaited with interest. Some engineers predict that in the future coking coal will be carbonized on such a large scale that coal gas will be used (straight or modified) for city distribution; others maintain that gas oil will be used in large quantities in the production of base gas; they believe that it will be economical to use oil even at appreciably higher prices. The question involves, among other; factors, consideration of initial and relative costs of equipment, flexibility of operation, salability of coke, cost of distributing different gases, and the relative value of by-products, It is common belief that for many years large quantities of oil will be used in gas-making, particularly in the generation of peak gas or that water gas will be used for the synthetic production of hydrocarbons to enrich additional water gas. In this paper interest centers in a discussion of the practicability of employing synthetic processes in view of reported investigations of the chemistry of the synthetic reactions. For many years it has been known that the chief components of water gas would react chemically under proper conditions to form methane. As long ago as 1903 a patent3 was issued in this country for a gas-making process which included the synthetic production of methane. More recently the studies of numerous investigators here and abroad have shown that besides methane it is possible to produce other paraffins, olefins, and additional, materials adaptable for enriching water gas or for other uses. The question arises: In what manner, if at all, can such processes be incorporated, as a part of the gas-making scheme in a city-gas plant?

Jan 1, 1928

By John Hays, Hammond

IT is both a pleasure and an honor to be a guest of the Institute and I thank you, Mr. President and fellow-members, for giving. me the opportunity of meeting you this evening. My esteemed friend, President Smith, has requested me to do a bit of "reminiscing" as to the earlier years of my career as a mining engineer, which has now covered a period of fifty years. Let me reassure you by promising that my narrative will not include all the experiences I have had over that long period. You will, I trust, pardon what might seem egotistical but I do not see how a personal narrative could well be otherwise.

Jan 1, 1928

THE Boston meeting, August 29-31, was in many ways one of the pleasantest the Institute has enjoyed in years. Much hard work had been done by the committee, and with excellent results. The program had been purposely restricted with the idea that a smaller, more homogeneous audience formed the best basis for a regional meeting, and the event fully justified the plan. The one hundred and sixty-three members and guests attending were dominantly interested in geophysical methods or their application, and, despite the highly technical character of the papers and the unusual heat, attendance and interest in the technical sessions were well sustained. The exhibition of geophysical instruments and aerial maps added greatly to the meeting.

Jan 1, 1928

By G. L. Oldright, F. W. Schroeder

Very great changes were made in the dimensions of the smelting hearths of the furnaces in the period from about 1800 to 1906, the length increasing from about 11 to 116 ft., and the width from 8 to 19 ft. During this time the tonnage smelted increased from about 9 to 250 tons per 24 hr., and the tons of charge smelted per ton of coal increased from 0.77 to 4.3. Dr. Mathewson3 noted no great difference in the "fuel ratio" (i. e., the amount of charge smelted per ton of coal) as the furnace at Anaconda was increased in length by stages from 85 to 116 ft. (The percentage of copper in the slag, however, was lowered from 0.42 to 0.36 per cent. The other components of the slag were not given.) Lump coal fired on grates was the fuel used during this period. The practice in operating the furnaces over such a length of time naturally varied considerably, and there were differences in composition and nature of the charge, yet it may he considered that the improvements made were due largely to increases in the size of the furnace used. Doubtless some credit should be given to improvements in operating technique, like changes in the methods of firing the lump coal. However, the greater part of the advance was probably due to factors influencing the

Jan 1, 1928

By W. G. Millar

Until a fire occurs, insurance and prevention work are often looked on as unavoidable necessities, but as insurance is back of all business credit, it is essential to know that in case of damage money will be available to cover the loss; while the interruption of production, often caused by a fire, brings home the realization that if prevention work avoids such an interruption, it is well worth while. Fire insurance is a legal contract guaranteeing the payment of large amounts to an owner, but it is possible there is no other important contract that receives so little consideration. Although previously carried on elsewhere, it is only of recent years that insurance engineering has been actively followed up in Canada, with inspections of an owner's property carried out for his benefit. Now inspections of this kind are made, advice on fire prevention and protection work ?is available, reports with recommendations with regard to the above are furnished periodically, and with this method applied the owner receives the broadest possible cover and security at the lowest cost. Rates are set by the underwriters by rating schedules which charge for defects in a building and allow credits for protection and other favourable features . These schedules are based on the past record of loss of mining properties as a class, so that a fire in another mining property indirectly affects you, but the amount paid is reduced in proportion as your property is improved. The writer feels, from personal experience, that there is no industry where fire prevention receives more attention than the mining industry, and it is a pleasure to advise that, due to this co-operation, some reduction in the basis rates for mining risks is now being made by the underwriters.

Jan 1, 1928

By Etienne S. Bieler

Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen, I come to you tonight distinctly as a physicist, not as a geologist or a mining man. My experience in applied geophysics has been short, and I do not doubt that many of you have a much larger acquaintance: with the subject than I have. A little over a year ago, the firm of Alderson, MacKay & Armstrong decided to investigate the possibility of developing a new method of electrical prospecting suitable to our northern Quebec and northern Ontario conditions, and asked me to take up the work. A preliminary survey of existing literature convinced me that the field of induction methods was most promising. I wish to give you some account of the work carried on last summer in the Rouyn district in this connection with the very able assistance of Mr. H. G. I. Watson. Geophysical methods of prospecting can be divided generally into four classes: magnetic, electrical, gravitational, and seismic. Each class depends on the existence of a definite property in which the valuable mineral to be discovered differs materially from the surrounding rocks. In the four classes, the property will be, respectively, magnetic permeability, electrical conductivity, density, and elasticity. By far the largest differences occur in the case of electrical conductivity, where it is not rare to find ratios of the order of several millions, or even billions, between ores, sulphide ores especially, and the surrounding rock. Hence the sensitiveness and delicacy of electrical methods. Of these four classes, only two, the electrical and the magnetic methods, have been put to extensive practical use in the discovery of metallic ores. The other two classes are important mainly in connection with oil detection.

Jan 1, 1928

By J. Edwin Van Buskirk

For a country that is as important a gold producer as Canada, the return to the gold standard of the major commercial countries of the world during the past five years is of particular significance. To the Canadian gold mining industry, the advantages of the gold standard are a matter of more than theoretical importance. According to economic theory, prices are determined by the relation between the demand for, and the supply of, money. The demand consists of the offering of goods for money; the more goods offered, the greater the demand. The supply consists of the total money available for the purchase of goods. The total supply of goods to be exchanged through the instrumentality of money remaining the same, an increase in the supply of money will, according to this theory, raise prices; conversely, a decrease in the supply of money will lower prices. Let us imagine that everyone in the world suddenly had twice as much money, and that the sum total of all goods remained the same. Is it not obvious that we would pay just double the price for these goods? In Canada today, most people have approximately 50 per cent grea.ter income than in 1913, and the average price for all articles sold in Canada is 50 per cent above those in 1913.

Jan 1, 1928

By Frank E. Cash

The Bureau of Mines in its safety work has for a number of years advocated and recommended the use of permissible portable electric cap lamps for use in all mines. In the course of time required for the evolution from an unsatisfactory to an efficient and safe light, but encouraging increase in their use has been experienced in Alabama. As early as 1916, small installations of these safer lamps were made or an experimental basis by several operating companies, and the first complete mine installation eras made at the Virginia mine of the Gulf States Steel Co., July 1, 1918. From the experiments in 1316 and the complete equipment of the first mine in 1918 gradual progress has been made until there are now 30 installations with 10 operating companies; as a result 20 mines have been put entirely and 5 partly on, closed lights, and 3 companies equip their engineering departments; two installations of closed lights are maintained by other companies for emergency use. One of the mines partly on the electric cap lamp is an ore mine - the only one in Alabama (and one of the very few in the United States) that uses closed lights. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The full cooperation of operating officials, lapmen, and lamp representatives was given in the collection of the data in this report, and is hereby acknowledged.

Jan 1, 1928

By Meissner, C. A.

THE tendency all over Europe, just as it is with us, is to go to the use of turbines for new construction or replacement of old steam or even gas engines. 'The lower construction cost and the lower operating cost, when they can have high steam temperatures and pressures, together with their efficiency, is the cause of this change to turbines, both high and low pressure. The present trend is to equip plants with modern, efficient steam boilers, turbines, etc., and gradually work into high-pressure superheated steam equipment to accomplish a saving. One company has just completed a 375 to 400 lb., 700 deg. superheated steam installation and turbo-blowers with this end in view. Some of our new steam plants are using 350 lb. working pressure.

Jan 1, 1928

By Becket, Frederick M.

CHROMIUM is but one hundred and thirty years of age-a mere youngster as related to many metals that' have speeded world progress. It was Vauquelin of France who proved conclusively that the so called red lead of. Siberia contained a new element. The variety and characteristic colors of the compounds suggested the name chromium. He also succeeded in reducing oxide of chromium to the metallic form and described the product as very brittle, infusible, needle- like crystals on which acids had very feeble action. His metal was not pure chromium, of course; it must have contained appreciable carbon in the combined form as a result of reducing the oxide by carbon at high temperatures. Vauquelin's description in 1798 of this work is a gem-indeed, literally, he went so far as to discover the presence of chromium oxide in the emerald. The metallic product did not seem to interest Vauquelin greatly, but a new chemical industry began shortly after his discoveries.

Jan 1, 1928

By John A. Dresser

Seventy years ago a period of prospecting and mining activity began in the Eastern Townships of Quebec that seems to have been quite equal to that of recent years in the Rouyn field. In the following six or seven years a large amount of work was done over a widespread area. About fifty deposits gave some shipment of ore, from a few tons upwards, and as many as five hundred occurrences of copper were made known in the district by official records. Comparing the scale of commercial undertakings of that time and of the present day, these developments must have occupied quite as large a share of the capital and man-power of the Province as northern Quebec employs today. Working conditions at that time were not very favourable. The country was then only newly opened for settlement, and colonists were few and widely separated. Roads of the class built today were unknown. A single line of railway, the Grand Trunk, crossed the district from east to west. Colonization companies controlled large blocks of land on which they owned mining rights and usually reserved these rights in whole, or in part, when selling the lands. Then, as now, the precious metals belonged to the Crown. Yet the work was not without its successes. One of the first deposits discovered, the Acton, was, for a few years, one of the most profitable producing copper mines of its time. Another, the Eustis mine, has been in almost constant operation ever since, and is now vigorously pushing further development. At least two others, now quiescent, proved profitable operations, and several made considerable production. The manufacture of sulphuric acid in Canada was begun by the founder of the Nichols Company at Capelton, on a deposit that is now being re-developed, after a long and creditable career.

Jan 1, 1928

By Notman, Arthur

THIS is a day of surpluses, some good and some not so good. One can hardly pick up a newspaper, magazine, review or economic treatise without confronting the fact that we have or are threatened with more .of certain goods than we have use for, whether it be corn, wheat, cotton, coal or oil, -lumber, 'leather, newsprint, automobiles, zinc, lead, copper or what not. How did this unprecedented state of affairs arise? Who is to blame? How shall we avoid smothering ourselves in our own production? The voice of the farmer is raised in appeal to the Government to relieve him from the dilemma of his own fertility. In answer the Government employs thousands of experts and spends millions of dollars to aid the farmer. But to what end? To make him still more efficient so that he may produce even greater surpluses? Not satisfied with the result, it spends other millions to prepare vast areas of the arid land of the West for more farmers to cultivate and insure yet larger surpluses. Then what? Naturally another appeal to the Government to fix prices by financing the

Jan 1, 1928

F A. THOMSON, president of the Montana School of Mines, gave an interesting talk on mining schools of the past, present and his ideas of the future before a recent meeting of the Montana Section of the A. I. M. E. He covered the history .of the various mining schools and com- pared the three main types of schools; those attached to or forming part of an endowed college or university such, for example, as' the Columbia School of Mines, the Mining Department of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the Mining Department of Stanford University. These resemble in a general way the second class, those attached to the state universities and colleges. The schools of this general type have had varied success.

Jan 1, 1928

By Salinger, Herbert

WITH the large amount of metallurgical re- search work now being done and the constant effort of the engineer to effect economies of operation, I think it is a safe prediction that the next few years will see a great change in the handling of mine products. The well-managed mine, with sufficient ore reserves to warrant the necessary plants, will increasingly call upon the metallurgist and chemist for the solution of its problems. Shipping sorted ore or concentrate to the nearest smelter will not be the course followed. From ore to metal, or at least to a product directly salable to the consumer, will be the practice followed. As a consequence, mine managers will be increasingly interested in metal trade problems. By metal trade I mean the buying, selling, shipping, handling, and all the practices, forms and customs that go to make up the trade.

Jan 1, 1928

THE problem of picking the best students for an engineering college can no longer, be considered as simply one of determining the amount of general ability, but rather of finding special aptitudes for scientific work, according to Carl C. Brigham~ a Princeton University professor, who has been conducting researches on methods of selecting engineering undergraduates at Cooper Union, an evening school in New York City. When we first began this investigation seven years ago," says Dr. Brigham, "we thought the whole job would be done a soon as we had found a good method of measuring general intelligence. Today we feel that we are still about five years away from a solution, but on somewhat firmer footing than when we were looking for general ability.

Jan 1, 1928

By G. L. Oldright

THE development of the reverberatory furnace for smelting copper ores up to 1912 was described by E. P. Mathewson1 with details concerning the great changes in dimensions of the furnace. Hayward2 tabulated similar data, giving developments up to about 1924, in his revision of Hofman's Metallurgy of Copper. DEVELOPMENT OF PRESENT SMELTING PRACTICE Dimensions of Furnace Very great changes were made in the dimensions of the smelting hearths of the furnaces in the period from about 1800 to 1906, the length increasing from about 11 to 116 ft., and the width from 8 to 19 ft. During this time the tonnage smelted increased from about 9 to 250 tons per 24 hr., and the tons of charge smelted per ton of coal increased from 0.77 to 4.3. Dr. Mathewson3 noted no great difference in the "fuel ratio" (i. e., the amount of charge smelted per ton of coal) as the furnace at Anaconda was increased in length by stages from 85 to 116 ft. (The percentage of copper in the slag, however, was lowered from 0.42 to 0.36 per cent. The other components of the slag were not given.) Lump coal fired on grates was the fuel used during this period. The practice in operating the furnaces over such a length of time naturally varied considerably, and there were differences in composition and nature of the charge, yet it may be considered that the improvements made were due largely to increases in the size of the furnace used. Doubt-less some credit should be given to improvements in operating technique, like changes in the methods of firing the lump coal. However, the greater part of the advance was probably due to factors influencing the

Jan 1, 1928

By V 9. 0 / 300 dpi

ATHOUGH turquoise mining was, so far as we know, the first large, well-organized mining operation,' gem mining, from the Roman con-quest of Egypt until the opening of the South African pipe diamond mines some 50 years ago, was largely carried on' by individuals 01' small companies in a relatively primitive way. Now" however" gem mining does not yield in efficiency or in scale of operations to the mining of other mineral products. In 1926 the diamond mines of the world milled some 9,000,000 cu. yd. and produced 0,43 cu. yd. diamonds, a remarkable example of concentration. The Premier Diamond Mining Co. up to Oct. 31, 1927, had milled 116,455,550 loads (each of 16 cu. ft.) from which 26,-217,144 carats of diamonds" worth £29,897,971 2s, 9d., were recovered. The Burma Ruby Mines, Ltd., operating sever-al alluvial mines in Burma in 1911-12, mined and milled 1,479,845 truckloads of gemmiferous earth for 15c. per load. We of the industry can there-fore, with good grace, disclose some of the myths and also describe some of the primitive mining methods of the, dark ages of our industry. The methods, so far as I know, were not patented, and if they were, the patents have expired, so that engineers in other branches of the art are free to use them if they see fit.

Jan 1, 1928

By Smith, George Otis

THE matter that I have on my mind this evening is engineering's need of an open forum. Our fathers of three centuries ago were pro-testanta for freedom of speech and thought in matters religious; later, our fathers were revolutionists for freedom of speech in matters political; until today freedom of speech has become so universal throughout the land that even in the sanctuary of our homes, at times, we have to turn off the loud-speaker. Talk is not always a condition of progress, but light is everywhere necessary to growth, whether the growing thing is a blade of grass, a baby chick, or a young idea, and we must regret anything that tends to shut out the light from the operations of business and industry. Of course, I realize there is little that is novel in what I am saying. Indeed, I have found that Dr. James Douglas-a name we love to honor in our Institute-as long ago as 1907, gave an address at the Toronto meeting that any of us would be proud to be author of twenty-one years after. Dr. Douglas at that time spoke on secrecy in the arts and the text then taken by this leader in metallurgical technique and in the constructive management of big business was "the dangerous temptation to adopt secretive methods by very large corporations." In both thought and language Dr. Douglas was direct and vigorous and he needs no internreter. He advocated the wide open door for ideas on two counts: advancement of technical knowledge and education of public opinion. A few sentences will serve not only to prove the vision of James Douglas, but also, I hope, tempt you to hunt up his address in the Institute's TRANSACTIONS, and thus get his whole thought first hand.

Jan 1, 1928

By G. L. Oldright

As sponge iron is much like porous, coarse sand, it is a tempting material to use in place of coarse scrap iron as a precipitant of metals, for scrap iron is relatively awkward to handle and exposes only a small amount of surface to pregnant solutions. The results of the experiments described in this bulletin are largely a record of the behavior of sponge iron as a precipitant of lead and copper under laboratory conditions comparable to those that would obtain in a commercial plant were it attempted to secure the maximum contact of surface between solution and precipitant. Physically, the study is largely one of the rates of diffusion of the metal ions in the solutions and through the metallic coatings surrounding the sponge iron particles. The practical objectives are to remove completely the valuable metals from solution and at the same time to obtain a precipitate of good grade. In order to fulfill this latter requirement, the precipitant should be almost completely consumed. These practical ends are usually secured by having the two substances involved pass each other counter-currently-that is, in such a manner as to have the strongest precipitant in contact with the most impoverished solution, and vice versa. EXPERIMENTS WITH LEAD SOLUTIONS In nearly all of the schemes involving the leaching of lead from its ores the metal has been put into solution as the chloride, and fairly concentrated liquors have been employed. The solubility of lead under such conditions is comparatively small at best; the hot pregnant liquors from which the metal is to be precipitated are then made nearly saturated with respect to lead, and only a very small amount of acid is used. Therefore it was not as necessary to learn the behavior of the sponge iron in precipitating lead from solutions of widely differing composition as to learn under what conditions, and with what mechanisms, this precipitation might be carried out most readily.

Jan 1, 1928

By E. H. Mohr

AT the McGill concentrator of the Nevada Consolidated Copper Co., all flotation operations have been carried out in Forrester cells since November, 1926. In respect to cost of operation, the new cell has proved to be superior to the Callow, which it supplanted, and its incorporation in the flow sheet has resulted in a marked improvement in the metallurgy. Before citing the advantages of the new machine over the old, it should be explained that the Forrester has not only replaced the Callow, but it has made possible the elimination of a number of tables as well. When Callow cells were in use, table concentration preceded flotation. The ball mill pulp was elevated, by means of air lifts, to roughing Wilfley tables situated two floors directly above the flotation floor. On an intermediate floor were additional tables which cleaned the concentrate from those above. The finished table concentrate constituted approximately 60 per cent. of the total mill production, and contained about 40 per cent. of the recovered copper. The table tailings were returned to the classifiers, the overflow from which went to the flotation cells and the oversize to the ball mills. As soon as the Forrester cells were installed, this tabling operation was discontinued. The ball mill pulp now discharges into the classifiers direct, without the intermediate tabling. It was impracticable to employ the present flow sheet when Callow cells were in use, for the reason that unless the greater part of the heavy mineral was first removed, it accumulated on the mats and adversely affected the flotation operation. By tabling ahead of flotation, it was practicable to maintain the concentrator at 10 to 20 per cent. greater capacity (depending up on the pyrite content of the ore) than was possible by flotation alone. This was due to the necessity for finer grinding in the latter case. Even though the table concentrates contained only 6 to 8 per cent. copper con- tent, the low smelting costs made it advantageous to operate at high mill capacity, at the cost of low grade of product. STANDARD SECTION EQUIPMENT With the old-flow sheet, a standard section consisted of four ball mills and classifiers, one air lift, 20 roughing tables, 10 cleaner tables, 12 primary

Jan 1, 1928