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PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC- COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO
24 November 1896.]
Chairman-continued.
Mr. PREECE.
words per annum to deal with, and I think that we may consider that for a commencement that is certainly a maximum. Your revised estimate is for a cable of 600 lbs. of gutta-percha and 750 lbs. of copper; that would carry a speed of how many words per minute?-A maximum speed of about 12 words per minute, which would come down to about six words a minute ordinary speed-business speed.
1401. About six words per minute business speed? Yes.
1402. Or on the duplex system, 12 words per minute, business speed?-Twelve words, yes."
1403. Twelve words per minute for 10 hours a day for 300 days gives-can you tell me?— About 2,000,000.
1404. Therefore the new lige, on the assump- tion of business which Mr. Sandford Fleming has prepared for it, would start, even on the 10 hours a day basis, with a capacity more than double what is necessary for the business that would come to it ?-Certainly.
1405. If the revised specification which you have presented to the Committee would carry 12 working words per minute on the duplex system, that would amount, at a rate of 10 hours a day of working for 300 days in the year, to about 2,000,000 words per annum ?-That would be so.
1406. And as Mr. Sandford Fleming has estimated that the business which this new cable would drop into from the commencement would stand at a maximum of 1,000,000 words per annum, therefore your cable would give a capacity double the necessity of the case, even on the assumption that you only worked 10 hours a day for 300 days in the year?-It would.
1407. What is the general practice now as to the application of the duplex system?—In our English system, in our land lines, it is the nor- mal state of affairs. Every important circuit is now duplexed, and it is gradually becoming the same with submarine cables. All the Atlantic cables are duplexed; most of the Eastern Tele- graph Company's lines are duplexed. You will get some very interesting information-I wish I were authorised to give it you of the work passing through Aden; cables from Aden to Zanzibar, and Bombay to Suez, to Mozambique, and to the Mauritius, and all the important cables are duplexed, so that you will get facts of the speed of working through these duplex
cables.
1408. We may take it as your very distinct opinion that it would be waste of time on the part of this Committee to consider the work of this cable, except from the point of view of duplex working?-Certainly. I should like to draw a distinction between duplex working and duplication of cable.
1409. Oh, certainly, we will come to duplica- tion presently. It would be folly to establish a long circuit like this without fitting it up with duplex working?-
1410. Will you kindly add to the table which you have handed in columns showing what the total number of words in real working could be carried by the various cores specified for, during
Chairman-continued.
[Continued.
the working year of 300 days, at ten hours a day, on the duplex system?—Yes.
1411. I suppose in any case, whatever the estimate of the business might be, it would be foolish not to start with a cable which bad a
large margin for the immediate business which
was likely to be available ?--Unquestionably.
opinion as to the proper calculation as to the 1412. But although you have given us your aimount of working hours in a year, I suppose we may assume that at times of pressure a much higher rate of working can be obtained?—Un- doubtedly.
1413. The question is simply that that pres sure can only be applied for special occasions, and not as a part of the permanent calculation?
That is so.
1414. You have satisfied yourself that the new core you would probably propose, if asked, would satisfy all the mechanical requirements for laying and lifting ?-Certainly.
1415. As regards this question of lifting and cutting in deep water, is it the universal practice now to cut the cable?-Universal.
1416. Simply because the cable could not be lifted as a whole ?—It is impossible to lift it as a whole, and there always has been, from the first cable that was laid, some mode of cutting it. They first employed two ships for the purpose; now they do it with only one ship, and the end cut is buoyed, and the ship goes a little further away and picks it up again.
1417. Now, on the question of duplication; are you or opinion that any cable laid to Australia via the Pacific ought to be a duplicate cable ?—I have no question in my mind about it, that for business men, for business purposes, you must anticipate-I would not do it at once-but you must anticipate sooner or later a duplicate cable.
1418. You would not lay it immediately?—No. 1419. Approximately, in what period of time would you advise the laying of a second cable? -I should think the preparations for the second cable ought to be made as soon as the first cable is in working order. You never know when your cable may break down; and for your cable to break down, and your well-worked up business to disappear, would be very poor manage
nient.
1420. What has been the history of duplication of old cables?—I do not know a single instance where reliance has been made on a single cabie. I cannot recall one to mind. The Anglo-American Company have laid five cables; the Direct United States Cable has only laid one cable, but then the Direct United States Cable and the Anglo- American are joint-purse people-they work to- gether; they do not care whether the one cable goes or not. The Western Union Company of New York at once laid two cables; the Com- mercial Cable Company of New York laid two cables, both in the same year; the Eastern Telegraph Company have duplicated and tripli- cated the whole of their system; they are not de- pendent anywhere upon a single wire. There is a company to the Canaries with only one cable, but that is not an English company; that is a
24 November 1896.]
Chairman-continued.
Mr. PREECE.
Spanish company, I cannot recall to mind a single instance; there may be; but I cannot recail a single instance of any commercial con- cern relying on one string to its bow.
1421. And what is the history of the first cables of the Eastern Extension Company to Australia; were they duplicated from the be- ginning No, they laid a single cable first, and as soon as the business grew and accidents hap pered, as they did, then they speedily laid down a second cable; but at first it was a single wire. 1422. And how long did it last as a single wire before the second cable was undertaken ?-1 could not answer that.
Sir Saul Samuel.
1423. That was interrupted by the injury done to it by the worm in the Coral Seas - Yes. Communication to Australia has been singularly It crosses very shallow waters.
unfortunate.
It has been subject to depredations of these borers and also to volcanic action and earth- quakes, and various causes that you will not meet in the Pacific. The action of borers has been entirely prevented by coating the gutta percha with brass tape. We do the same here in the Channel; we are obliged to do it.
Chairman.
1424. What is the depth of water in which that coating is necessary?—I do not think life has been detected at greater depths than 100 fathoms.
1425. You have heard the evidence given by various cable manufacturers; are you of opinion that there is anything, or that there is nothing. in the way in which a cable is manufactured, given the same material?-There really is a great deal. In the first place, there can be no difference in the copper--in the quality of the copper, but there is a great difference in the way in which the copper forming the conductor is laid up together. Messrs. Siemens' centre core is a large wire, and smaller wires are round it. The result is it does give a small electrical advantage in the speed of working. There is great variety indeed in the character of the gutta-percha. I was
rather surprised to find that none of the witnesses of whom you asked that question seemed to know anything about the manufacture of These different manufacturers gutta-percha. have different modes of preparing the percha; the percha itself is masticated before it is warmed up to be placed over the wire; it is placed over the wire when it is in a plastic state, its plasticity being due to heat, and before it gets in its position it is pommelled, washed, ill-used in a most brutal fashion cutting knives and rollers, of all sorte and kinds, and it is washed over and over again in the purest water Now the Telegraph Construction Company have one mode of preparing the gutta-percha; Siemens has another; the India Rubber Company have another; and Henleys have quite another mode of preparing gutta-percha, and the result is that all these manufacturers turn out their gutta- perchs in different qualities.
Chairman-continued.
[Continued.
1426-7. And is there a good deal in the method by which the cable, when manufactured, is tested before being laid?-Everything. A cable when it is made, however short it is, is not only tested for every inch for every pound of material-- fur inaterial used-it is not only tested by the manu- facturer first, but it is tested by the inspecting officers of the purchaser. For every cable manufactured by us we have a staff of inspectors who are at the works during the whole time that the cable is being constructed. Every material is tested for strength, for durability, for quality, for comparison with the specification, and as the cable is manufactured and coiled into the tanks, it is tested inch by inch, and tested until “AY,
it gets on board ship. The result is that it is the rarest thing in the world now to find a cable sent away from our shores that has any defect in it. I have sent several cables to different parts of the world at different times, and they always arrived in perfect order and were laid without anything being heard of them.
1428. What estimate would you advise us to look to for repairs and maintenance I think that the estimates submitted by the Silvertown Company and by Siemens are very fair. They are based on the assumption that you will require two ships, and I think
you do.
The distances are so great that you would be bound to have two ships there, and, of course, the cost of maintenance is made up of the up-keep of the ship and the probable cost of the amount o cable used in repairs.
If there is no repair your ships are there, they are having a very good time but, of course, their cost must naturally go against your receipts as working
expenses.
1429. What will n ship cost? We have got two repairing ships in England. . One is called the Monarch"; she is a very nice boat, indeed and the other one is the "Alert"; a sinaller one.
The cost of the "Monarch" is rather less than such a ship as would be required in the Pacific. She runs us about 20,0007, I should not like to estimate for less than 30,000/ a year myself.
I do not
1430. For each ship?-For each ship. 1431. You are aware that that is very con- what these expert witnesses silerably over
I think Mr. Taylor said, yester- have told us. day, about 15,000 a year? -Oh, yes. think he had ever had to pass the pay-bills or sign the pay-bills of a ship as I have to do every week. Our ship costs us 20,000, a year- that you may take as an absolute certainty, and she is a smaller ship than would be necessary, although it may be that owing to our working 80 much in shallow water we have more men, but I think myself that we ought to allow about 30,0007. a year.
to
1432. If we allowed 60,0001, a year for two ships we should be safe?-Oh, quite safe. There is a pamphlet by Mr. Siemens which I think gives it. He allows-it comes about 40,000. The total he allows is 90,000%. For that he takes 200 nautical miles, which mean 55,000%, and 55,000/. from 90,0001. is what he estimates.
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