Page
THE STEEL AGREEMENT
(Special Air Mall Service)
an-
London, Aug. 5, The announcement that the In- ternational Agreement between the Continental Steel Cartel and the British Iron and Steel Federa- tion had been signed took many people by surprise. Extension of, the temporary agreement "beyond the date originally agreed-Augst 7-had been generally anticipated and, indeed, semi-officially nounced. The extenson for a fur Cher perod of four months-to De- Cember T-phus recognised 33 necessary to allow time for com- pletion of the complicated rangements for equitable distribu- tion of the reduced steel imports in Britain and for the co-ordina tion of interests in exports. That a full and binding agreement for five years would be agreed and the signed before the expiry.or temporary agreement was not gen-
and erally anticipated,.
it must have been in the nature of a pleasant surprise. "even to those sanguine of its ultimate consum. mation.
ar-
The
SCIENCE OF COAL MINING
Progress In Colliery Engineering
Developments of importance to colliery engineering are compre- hensively dealt with in "Haulage and Winding," by Professor Gran ville Poole (Ernest Bena, London: £3 35 net). This large volume. not in which the author does claim to have completed the sub- ject. is certainly one of the most valuable works ever published on those aspects of modern engineer- ing.
The volume is necesarily of the large proportions, owing to great Improvemerits made in re- cent years in coal-getting opera- dons, an example being the fact that the use of conveyors has been extended to transport "coal miles underground.
The
some author
deals in systematic manner with the transport of coal from the time the coal is broken down at the face. Con veying and hoisting mineral from the workings to the surface is extensively dealt
271 with, and types of conveyors are reviewed,
Reference is made to the ad- vantages of conveying along long- wall faces, methods of moving the conveyor, the "drag-lined kader, scoop loading. gate-end loaders, telescopie toaders, conveyor the cords, face operations etc., while
are For other chapters devoted to.
pipeline transmission, the various types of tubs. tub control gear. track gear, haulage problem from horse haulage to endless- chain systems, elecric and loco- motive haulage. compressed-air locomotives. and haulage cidents.
The Importance of the agree ment cannot be gainsaid. great steel industries of Germany, France, Belgium and Luxemburg are inked, by the strong ties of communal interest and complete understanding, with the steel in-
Britain in dustry of Great vitar matter of steel exports. five years their joint interests in steelmaking and steel selling will be co-ordinated and controlled by a common policy. Ruinous price- cutting and destructive "dumping" are at an end so far as these European countries are concerned. Economic prices and rational con- trol will bring to the steelmakers of Europe the chance of
some
measure of prosperity. It is notorious that the steel industries of the world have given the poorest kind of return to invested capital for many years. Not only in our own country, where since 1921 few steelworks have made anything like reasonable profits and many have made only losses, but on the Continent and in America the re- turns on capital have been meagre In the extreme. Such a state of affairs is neither good for the in- dustry nor the country to which It belongs. It is impossible to at- tract fresh cap'tal to an industry which is making losses. The lack of capital retards progress.--- pre- ven'ts the improvement and modemisation of plant, and results
increas'ng Inefficiency
in
heavler losses.
and
For these reasons alone, were there no other and more cogent ones, we would welcome the suc céss which has attended the fre- quent conferences between the British and Continental steel- makers since the inaugurating nieeting in December of last year, From a purely selfish point of view the security and conadence which the agreement gives to the British. "steel industry will enable long- distance planning of schemes for improved and more "economic pro- duction. Increased efficiency and lower costs will enable steelmakers to preserve the stability of prices, 50 necessary to the increasing number of steel consumers, while at the same time assuring them of a reasonable return on invested capital.
re
WINDING APPARATUS The total output of the mine and the safety of those who work underground depend largely on the reliability of the winding en- gine, and the chapters on this subject are among the most in- teresting in the book. Special re- Terence is made to electric win- ding engines moment diagrams. and skip winding. In mining, as in engineering generally, the in- creasing use of electric energy is among the leading developments. and many will agree with the author's conclusions that modern tendencies seem to favour the electically driven winding engines. It is stated that one manufactur- ing company alone has erected no fewer than 500 large electric win-
ders in various parts of he world. Illustrating the progress made
in
this branch of mining ezTM gineering. It is stared that the Arst electrically driven winding engine was installed in 1900, while In 1933 the aggregate electric horse-power used for winding purposes in British mines was no less than,, 153.880.
Of particular intest to students are the many diagrams and tables given in his volume, including horse-power curves, winding, for- mulae and problems, chapters on shaft equipment, decking opera- tions, and ropes, to name a few.
The volume contains hundreds of illustrations and diagrams, and is a serviceable, combination of theory and practice.
Colliery
officials will all find something of interest in the volume. and for students of colllery engineering it may well be regarded as a stan- dard work.
EXIT THE LEWIS GUN
(Special Air Mall Service;
The prosperity and greater eff- clenty of the steel industry Is bound to have wide and beneficial repercussions, Coal production will be stimulated, the engineering trades will benefit, and the Special Areas will find their distresses ameliorated. The achievement of the agreement, with all that It
London, Aug. 5. means in the way of added pros-
It was announced in the House perity, could have been possible
or 'Cotfimons that the days of that without the aid of the National
ominous plaything the Lewis gun Government. There is no doubt
are numbered so far as the Bri-" at all that the drastic increases in
tish army is concerned; the War the ton and steel tariff in March
Ofice has decided to replace it by the last brought the Continental
Czecho-Slovakian weapon known, makers face to face with realities.
as the Bren gun. The new gun Before that there was a tendency
will be made at Enfield from the to let matters drift, to awali la posable change in the political Czecho-Blovakian patents, and a royalty will be paid for the use weather, but the decisive action of
of them. Doubtless it will be the Government forced an early
some considerable time before the decision. It has been a triumph
Lewis gun completely vanishes for the bargaining weapon. On higher grounds the agreement will from the equipment of the Bri- be welcomed by lovers of peace. tish army and its characteristic When the basic Industries of five sharp, staccato "bursts of fre" European Great Powers agree to a five cartridges a a time for prac unity of policy in Ukport marketstice purposes will continue to be and to a five-years trace to destruc tive competition, it is an additional safeguard against that commercial Jehioasy which has so often been the cause of laternational strife The dignatories to this agreement a to be most cordially congrats Isted in the corepletion of a states, Suknike plan..
heard from the rifle ranges of this country. Bunday afternoon is a good time for hearing them on Lancashire ranges, for then the country Territorials are at work.
The Lewis gun is one of those Hght rifles which tre as released from
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HONG KONG DAILY PRESS, SATURDAY A AUGUST 24, 1935.
ENGINEERING AND BUILDING
PROBLEM FOR AUTOMOBILE
ENGINEERS
Prevention Of Cylinder Wear
As mentioned here on previous occasions, one of them quite re- cently, the research department of the Institution of Automob la Engineers has defakely proved that the chief cause of excessive cylinder wear is corrosion, aris- og from the acids formed dur- ing the process of combustion in the starting and warming-up of a cold engine. But although this cause has been determined,
that eventually this now all-im- portant problem will be solved by prevention rather than cure or palliative
CAR SPEED AND GEAR RATIO It is general practice among experienced' motorists to form some mental picture of the capa- bilities of various cars by noting the gear ratios in each case.
The top-gear ratio is consider-
the best preventive of cylindered chiefly as a rule, for. other wear has yet to decided upon
Of late there have been var- ous methods and means or re- ducing cylinder wear put forward, but none of these goes as far in that direction as is, desirable. Even the claims made on their behalt do not specify a reductior of more than 50 per cent of the Wear ordinary experienced
offhand it would seem that the. Ideal plan would be either to pre- vent the formation of the acides that are the prime cause of the trouble or to neutralise them, and in the second I.A.E. report on this subject in general suggestions to the later end were made though they did not go so far as to imply that the matter had been settled thereby once and for all; the suggestion were somewhat tenta- tive.
Next, and not far if at all be- hind in desirabi'ity, would be the -use of material for cylinder bores tha should be, as far as possible, res stert to corrosion from acids in
question. This plan "might, indeed, be the simplest of uny, and it is one that is favour ed n some quarters as a result of comparative tests that have been made with cy'inder bores of various metals.
-Figures issued recently concern- ing the rate of wear of a parti- cular type of cylinder liner used In seven differen, kinds of engine show that, over periods of use representing from 17,000 miles at the lowest to 70,000 miles at the highest, the wear" of the liner bores was from one-third to one- tenth that of the cylinder bores of the original cast-iron.
The greatest benefit was der- 1red in cases where conditions of we encouraged the formation of the corrosive acids (e. short, runs with the engine rarely warmed up; so it may be said that the greater the risk of the disease de- veloping the more effective the preventive measure proved to be There is stil cause for hope, shen,
the cartridges as they are red; that is why, if you leave a space alter each Ave cartridges on the en the drum which contains them, the gun will fire those five and then pause. In actual war fare no gaps are left in the drum.
and then the gun should fire con-" tinuously so long as its trigger is kept depressed. That was the theory, but the gas impetus did not always work so obligingly; in the Great War Lewis guns were known to cease fire and jam at some singularly awkward consequently tragic moments.
THE GUN'S INVENTOR
If anyone thinks that British troops ought to be armed with British weapons he may be re- minded that the Lewis gun itself was not of English origin. It was invented by a United States soldier," Colonel Isaac Newton Lewis, and was rejected by the military authorities of his OVE country, though Colonel Lewis was an instructor and director of
United States artillery school at Fort Monroe, He retired in 1913 and in the same year his in- vention of a light quick-firer
gun
fairly heavy it seemed at times to members of a Lewis team") that could be carried by infantry was accepted by the Bri lish, French, and Belgian Govern- ments. When the United Staes entered the world war his gun was approved by his own country, and from then, until the end of the war be waived all royalties op the Lewis gun made for the United States Government, there' by sacrificing a sum of $1,216,000.
things being equal, it
enables
comparisons to be made, mental- ly, between the capabilities of the cars in mind in such matters as speed, acceleration, max top-gear bill-climbing, and to some extent petrol economy.
Such comparisons are, however, jus.ifled only when and where other things are equal, these "hings." these factors, including tyre size, engine dimensions, en- gine efficiency, and ear weight.
But of these factors only tyre sze need be considered in con- junction with gear ratio when mental comparison is made be- tween the general characteristics of two or more given cars of much the same size, weight, and engine power-and as rule in these masters like is compared with like, approximately, when com- parison is made.
દ
If however, tyre size (tyre dia- meter or circumference), is not taken into account any mental Picture of the performance char- acteristics of the cars in question may be greatly at fault; a large size of tyre in one case and a re- latively small tyre in another may cause the maximum speed of the car with the larger res to be several miles per hour fas- ter than the other at a given en- gine speed, even though the top- gear ratios are precisely the same.
On the other hand, the car with the smaller tyres will have bet- ter accè eration and take steeper hills on top gear, hough it will be less pleasant to drive under normal raning conditions on level and merely undulating roads, and probably use more pet- rol under these conditions. It has been suggested that, to enable 'mental comparisons to be made with the factor of tyre sizę taken into account automatically, as it were, motor manufacturers should quote the effective rather than the actual gear ratios, using a formula that would give the only information of real use in this connection-viz, the number of „revolutions of the engine required to drive the car a given distance. say 10 yards. Whether this will be done remains to be seen, but meanwhile motorists who have occasion and inclination to com- pare different cars according to their gear ratios should keep in mind the factor or tyre size and note whether there is similarity or diversity in this matter.
i:
PETROL FOR EMERGENCË USE
11
When petrol was invariably sold from or in two-gallon Ling it was almost universal practice for motorists to carry a spare tin on the car for emergency use. But, with the coming of the filling- sation pump and the provision by car manufacterers of a feed" control that retaided one or two. gallons of petrol in the tank, un- less and until "the" control was moved to a position marked "Re- serve, the spare petrol tin pro- gressively ceased to form a part- of the equipment of cars.
And now, with mechanical and electromagneto fuel pumps and a petrol gauge on the instrument board, even the "reserve tar" is disappearing. The motor stit may be said, is now "carrying all bis (fuel)eggs" in one basket. If he omits to note that his gauge tells him the tank is prac ically empty or if his fuel pump should fa (a possibility, despite the de pendable nature of this kind of device), he may well find himself standed by the roadside with B car in good order but lacking ~ petrol where I wanted—Le, in the carburetter an
I have been reminded of this helplesseness of the owner-driver on an up-to-date car without pet«
rol or with s petrol pump de- ranged, by noting on a friend's car a new product al Solex Ltd., the carburetter manufacturers. It is a small tank holding a pint of petrol (there is also a quart, size. I learn), with a flexible pipe giv- ing a gravity feed through a spe- cial adapter on the carburetter; either this emergency supply or the usual pump feed can be put' into effect without dismantling anything. but merely by moving a two-way tap.
The rank fits on the front of the dash-board and has a second- ary purpose, in that, if it be filled and its contents made to serve until the car runs to a standstill, one has only to note the distance covered, as shown by the speedo- meter, to obtain-by simple men- tai arithmette-an immediate in- timation of he rate of petrol con- sumption of the car.
HEADLIGHTS RULES
The Minister of Transport's proposed headlight rules have not aroused much adverse criticism, although they promise to add more complications in the use of motor vehicles. How is it pro- posed, one wonders, 10 ascertain if lights · conform to anti-dazzle requirements?
A person must not be dazzled if standing on the same horizon- tal plane as the vehicle at a grea- ter distance than 25, with their eye level not less than 3ft 6in. above that plane. There is no standard of dazzle-It varies with individuals-and it is doubifül i this definition can be enforced.
has A well-known - motorist given his opinion that" defect on of headlighis to conform to this requirement is dangerous in the case of cyclists carrying renectors only. His solution is the use of lamps constructed so as to be permanently non-dazzling to an-. coming vehicles" without contrpl by the driver. That, most of us will agree, is the ideal but, un- fortunately, it has not yet proved attainable.
Colonel Jarrött cisima that lamps complying with these con- ditions are in existence, but if they are it is strange they are not more widely known. For many years experiments have been made in this direction, and claims have been advanced for a number of lamps, but up to the present ,the loss of efficiency has always
been too great.
To produce an anti-dazzle beau is a mater of no great difficulty, but to retairs the full standard of illumination and penetration is an entirely different matter. T a non-dazzling lamp which "In- volves no sacrifice of efficiency is known to Colonel Jarrott he might inform a widely interested public.
HEIGHT OF HEADLAMPS
It is laid down that headlamps must not be more than 3ft, above the ground. Measuring the height of my owa-and they are not set low-I find they are 3ft. Zin. above the ground, and it would be in- teresting to know why such an abnormal figure as 6ft. has been choseri
1.
An ample height would be 37. or 3ft ein, Perhaps commercial vehicle headlights might have been in the mind of those who drafted the regulations, but even so there is no reason why a lesser height should not have been im- posed. The height of the lamp should be fixed in the interests of those in front of it, and not behind it.
".
effective he.ght. The most should have been decided, and enforced for all types of vehicles whatever their frontal designs or dimensions. To prohibit the use ur headl gbp when a car is sta- tiunary is quite pound, and there
is ro objection to limiting side- lamp bulbs to 6 watts, aul, one wonders how, and by wham, can all these regulations be enforced.
Essentials are being los sight of under a mass of well-meant, and unenforceable rules and regula tions. While the police are trap- ping drivers exceeding I'mts by a few miles an hour, charg'ng un- fortuna has
whose fall-light bulb overing a, crimin- actually failed to s'gi. the reckless
career
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