Search Documents

By AIME AIME

ENGINEERS in the past have been largely associated with private enterprise and there has been a considerable tendency on the part of some members of our profession to depreciate government service for engineers. We engineers must change our mental attitude about employment in government service, particularly in view of the present most friendly attitude of the U. S. Civil Service Commission toward engineers for major posts in our Government. We must also take a much more active interest in public affairs. It must be realized that the national-defense program, which we are now organizing, will require for its effectiveness large numbers of engineers skilled in a wide range of technical and administrative services. In fact, the success of this undertaking will depend largely upon the extent to which our Government can command expert engineering talent to serve during the emergency. There is an acute shortage of technical and supervisory engineering personnel not only in the industries concerned with national defense but also in the Army, Navy, and other defense agencies of the Government. By an Act of Congress, approved on Oct. 9. 1940. $9,000.- 000 was turned over to the U. S. Office of Education, the regular defense agency of the Government which has co-operated with higher education for

Jan 1, 1941

By Nathaniel Herz

PARTING of bullion before shipment to the mint had been considered by the Homestake Mining Co. at various times, but had never been attempted before 1933, be- cause the margin of profit appeared to be too small to warrant the complications in refining. When the gold standard was abandoned by the United States in the spring of 1933, however, parting of the bullion was decided upon. The method selected was the Miller or chlorine process, which consists of the passing of gaseous chlorine into a bath of molten bullion, converting all metals other than gold into chlorides, and remov-

Jan 1, 1935

By N. G. Johnson

ALL of us are only too familiar with the fact that first the defense program, and finally the war, required vastly increased production from existing sources, and the discovery and development of new sources of minerals and metals. For this vast program, the explosives industry was well prepared. I use the term "well prepared" to cover all the phases of explosives service, which include formulation, design, manufacture, distribution, and application.

Jan 1, 1944

By Clyde E. Williams

THROUGHOUT its history the American iron and steel industry has constantly striven to improve the quality and reduce the cost of its products. No one needs to be told how well it has succeeded. Its success in making steel products at such a low cost has been achieved mainly through large-scale production. While costs have gone down as the rate of production and the degree of mechanization increased, quality of product has been actually improved. Thus high-tonnage records are important only in the light of high quality of the steel. Quality is the watchword! Continual improvement in quality has come as a result of research, not only in the laboratory but in the large commercial units in the plant. In fact, so many operations of the industry are on such a huge scale that experimental work must be done under commercial operating conditions so every progressive steel plant is a research laboratory.

Jan 1, 1938

By H. P. Wheeler

WHEN Germany invaded Poland in September, 1939, the only operating helium plant in the United States was that near Amarillo. Texas, supplied with helium-bearing natural gas from the near-by Cliffside gas field. Today the Bureau of Mines has five plants capable of producing more than 25 times the prewar helium output of the Amarillo plant. Two of the plants have received Army-Navy "E" flags for their part in the faraway "Battle of the Atlantic," where heliumfilled Navy blimps chased Adolf Hitler's submarines away from American shores. Meteorologists, watching balloons carried high into the stratosphere by helium, determined weather conditions that influenced the selection of D-day and dates for other military operation. Demand for helium doubled overnight when the Navy decided to expand its lighter-than-air activities; and as the blimp patrol proved effective, the helium demand became ever greater. A tribute to the success of the Bureau of Mines in meeting the demand for helium was paid by the late Secretary of the Navy, Frank Knox, in a letter to the Secretary of the Interior on April 10, 1944. Secretary Knox wrote, in part,

Jan 1, 1945

By John Garcia

COAL MINING, as well as all the other major in-dustries of Russia, is controlled by the Soviet Gov-ernment by means of organizations in each dis-trict, known as "Trusts," such as the "Kisel Coal Trust" in the Urals, the "Donugol Trust" in the Ukraine, etc., and each Trust functions as a unit, reporting direct to the chief of the department of the government at Moscow. The responsible head of each Trust is usually a mem-ber of the Communist party and, filtered through his organization, one generally finds a fair proportion of Communists in "key" or important positions, such as purchasing agents and local managers or superinten-dents, but in the majority of places requiring technical or professional knowledge, or trained brains and ex-perience, little or no attention is paid to a man's political opinion provided, of course, he "behaves himself." These different Trusts were authorized or ordered by the Central Committee at Moscow to investigate the methods of mining and type of mines developed in all other coal producing, countries of the world, and after a period of several years of intensive investigation and study reported back to headquarters that the modern American mines were the most efficient, recommending that the program for the rehabilitation of the Russian coal mining industry should follow the lines of American practice. The Trusts were then authorized to negotiate with American engineering firms for technical service for mine designs, and invited Americans to send commis-sions to Russia to prepare and submit to the Technical Council one or more projects for a complete modern American-type operation adapted to the local conditions. A "project" is a preliminary set of designs on the entire mine, top and bottom, with specifications. cost estimates, production costs, schedule of operation, budget of expen-diture, etc., and is quite an elaborate and sizable under-taking-I might say, it took six of us working tooth and nail for over three months to finish our first project.

Jan 3, 1928

THE following employment items are mode available to AIME members on a nonprofit basis by the Engineering Societies Personnel Service, Inc., operating in cooperation with the Four Founder Societies. Local offices of, the Personnel Service are at 8 W. 40th St., New York 18; 100 Farnsworth Ave., Detroit; 57 Post St., San Francisco; 84 E. Randolph St., Chicago 1. Applicants should address all mail to the proper key numbers in care of the New York office and include 6c in stamps for forwarding and returning application. The applicant agrees, if placed in a position by means of the Service, to pay the placement fee listed by the Service. AIME members may secure a weekly bulletin of positions available for $3.50 a quarter, $12 a year. POSITIONS OPEN Mining Engineer with some engineering training, capable of doing mapping, surveying, exploration, geology and transit work. Location, New York State. Y7333. Mineral Dressing Engineer, B.S. Mining or Chemical Engineering, age to 35. Must have knowledge of flotation. Duties will be in applied research and field evaluation of cationic and anionic flotation agents. Salary, $3500 to $7000 depending on experience. Location, Chicago. R-8971. Geological Draftsman, 25 to 30, with some experience in working with a geologist. Salary, $5100 a year. Location, New York, N. Y. Y7153.

Jan 1, 1952

By JOHN A. FULTON

THE Comstock Lode is in Storey County, Nevada, and extends in a north and south direction through the towns of Virginia City and Gold Hill, with a total length of 4.27 miles. Its mines have produced silver and gold to a known value exceeding $400,- 000,000 since 1859, when the work first began. More than $126.000,000 was paid in dividends by the mining companies, although much more than this was probably realized from the ore, because many milling companies were independent companies owned by the directors and superintendents of the mines. The milling companies' contracts called for an extraction of only 65 per cent and, as much of the ore was worth $100 a ton and up- ward, they must have recovered substantial amounts for their own accounts over and above this guarantee. Gold was discovered in the spring of 1850 by a party of Normons bound for California. The discovery was made at the mouth of Gold canyon near Dayton, on the Carson River, about 10 miles south of Virginia City.

Jan 1, 1929

By A. B. Stickney

UPWARDS of 200,000 engineers in this country are sufficiently interested in engineering as a profession to have joined a society, but not over 10% of them belong to any one society. There is a widely-felt need of an over-all organization of all the societies to act as spokesman for all engineers on matters of common concern. On a local basis, over 100,000 engineers in 35 metropolitan areas have organized themselves into local councils, and are doing an effective job of intersocietal co-operation within their sphere of activity. In the last few years much has been said and written about a similar organization on a national scale. Everybody wants iteverybody is talking about it-it's in the air-it's coming-it's inevitable. Although it is no longer necessary to talk about why or whether there should be such an organization, there is no such unanimity about what it should be like. This paper outlines a proposed organization by answering four questions-who, how, what, and who will pay for it.

Jan 1, 1946

By Geo. W. Bain

PRODUCERS of building stone have had to seek new and attractive uses for their output to supplement the diminished orders for standard products. Lunar is the direct result of the need of new outlets for marble and is. probably the most ingenious and attractive type to reach the market in a quarter of a century. It is a highly translucent stone which retains the same glistening sparkle in transmitted light that marble exhibits by incident rays. This sparkle sets it apart entirely from translucencies made of glass or even onyx, alabaster, and the distinctive exceedingly fine textured calcite marbles produced in Alabama and quarried formerly in northern Vermont and Quebec.

Jan 1, 1936

By E. G. Dahlgren, Dan O. Howard

THE West Edmond oil field, which covers parts of Oklahoma, Canadian, Kingfisher, and Logan Counties in the State of Oklahoma, is in geographical extent the largest single oil field found in the state. At the present time, its area of 26,800 acres is almost twice as large as the Oklahoma City field, which hitherto was the state's largest field. Many authorities believe that the West Edmond field is the most important oil pool found in the United States since Pearl Harbor. The discovery of the field without the help of geological, geophysical, or other recognized technical information, the fact that the oil and gas accumulated in a stratigraphic or wedge-type trap, and the rapid development of the productive area under wartime conditions are some of the interesting features of the field. The West Edmond field lies west of the Oklahoma City, Britton, and Edmond fields. The field is in an area that has been considered on the west flank of the Granite Ridge line of folding, on which a number of Central Oklahoma's most important oil fields are located. Over a period of years, especially since the discovery of the new pools such as Oklahoma City, Edmond, Britton, and Crescent, the general area of the West Edmond field has been explored intensively by geological and geophysical methods. This led at times to the drilling of a few dry Wilcox sand tests.

Jan 1, 1945

By S. K. Bradford

(Pittsburg Meeting, March, 1910.) FOR years past I have traveled in quest of promising mining-properties, over almost impassable mountain-trails to remote places in the mining-regions, usually, many miles from an assay-office. If, upon examination, the formation and the ore-deposit appeared favorable, a quick determination of the value of my samples was necessary, in order that I might take intelligent action with reference to the acquisition of the property. A journey with my samples to civilized regions often meant weeks of delay, and perhaps loss of opportunity. How many, under similar circumstances, have returned with their assay-results from such a journey, only to find that some audacious speculator had " optioned" the property ! True, a first payment could have been made and the chances taken on the results; but experience has taught that rich-looking ore is not of necessity valuable. Personally, I would not hazard a ten-dollar bill on any property without first determining by assay the value of the ore. To carry the usual complete assay-paraphernalia over such mountain-trails was impracticable by reason of the loss of time involved, the great expense of transportation (charged according to weight), and the fact that a few such trips would almost certainly wreck the outfit. For these reasons I began a process of elimination and substitution which finally enabled me to carry, in an ordinary 26-in. valise, sufficient apparatus and supplies for, say, 100 assays of adequate commercial accuracy. My final outfit was as follows: APPARATUS. Small hammer; steel mortar (2.5 in. wide, 3 in. high, with stand sawed off flat, so that it can be used as an anvil and for

Jan 1, 1911

By Oscar E. Harder

THE TERM "physical metallurgy' is used in the title of this lecture in preference to "metallography ?because the former has a broader meaning with most audiences, some people thinking of the latter as being limited to work with the microscope. This distinction, how- ever, has not been held by the out- standing workers in the field of metallography, such as the late Professor Sauveur. In the broadest sense metallography is essentially the same as physical metallurgy. The American Society for Testing Materials has adopted-the following definition: "Metallography is that branch of science which relates to the constitution and structure, and their relation to the properties of metals and alloys." This definition might be improved by adding after "properties" -"and their industrial and scientific uses." Metallography has also been defined as the science of metals and alloys. Physical metallurgy is to be distinguished from process metallurgy in that the latter relates particularly to the production of metals from the ores.

Jan 1, 1940

By Cloyd M. Smith

A FEW years ago, the Ventilation Committee established the practice of presenting one topic each year for discussion at the annual meeting. The practice has met good response on the part of committee members and I suggest that it be continued. The topic chosen for this year, "Underground Anemometry," is a topic which has bothered me for more than 20 years. It seems to me that the coal industry is content to rely on slipshod methods for measuring the rate of flow of air underground, so I prefaced my discussional charge to committee members with the statement that I regard air measurements made in the usual way, with hand held anemometer, as no good. Agreements and disagreements came in from more than a dozen engineers, some of whom are with operating companies, coal and metal; some with manufacturers; others with government agencies.

Jan 1, 1949

By R. W. Raymond

AT the Pittsburg meeting of the Institute, in March, 1910, the death of Mr. Metcalf was announced, and Col. H. P. Bope, of Pittsburg, delivered in memory of him a brief but eloquent address, which, though expressing the sorrow of Mr. Metcalf's friends, and, in general terms,. the debt of gratitude which his country and his profession owed to him, was not intended to be a complete survey of his life and work. With Colonel Bope's permission, and with the aid of some of the statements in his address, I substitute for it, in our Transactions, this more detailed, yet still inadequate memorial. As Colonel Bope justly remarked, the men who could do justice to this theme-such men, as Jones, Chalfant, Bennett, Oliver, and Park-passed away before Metcalf, leaving him almost the last of the generation of great steel-makers who made Pittsburg the Sheffield of America, and who discharged a double function, as the rear-guard of the old metallurgical practice and the van-guard of the new. I knew many of them; would that I were better qualified to celebrate their achievements. William Metcalf was born Sept. 3, 1838, at Pittsburg, Pa., where his father, Orlando Metcalf, was an eminent member of the bar. At the age, of sixteen, he entered the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, at Troy, N. Y., from which he was graduated in June, 1858. Returning to his native city, he became an assistant engineer in the Fort Pitt Foundry, of which. he was made Superintendent in 1859. This famous establishment produced the largest castings and heaviest machinery then known in the United States;-and Mr. Metcalf's intense, intelligent and incessant study of his business prepared him as a manufacturer for a patriotic service to his country more valuable than, as a soldier, he could have rendered in the field. The call came in 1862, when the government needed, above all things, a supply of field, naval and siege artillery. The

Apr 1, 1911

By R. W. Jenkins, O. J. Neslage

The need for mechanized drilling to decrease mining costs has resulted in the development of the jumbo from column-and-bar drill carriages to hydraulically controlled jib jumbos. Resultant savings from use of improved jumbos have been high enough usually to retire the machinery investment within a year. The jib jumbo unit has been applied successfully to development and preparation programs and flat-bedded stopes, and an even wider field is forecast for its use.

Jan 1, 1950

By J. M. GLEDHILL

(Washington Meeting, May, 1905.) A Discussion of Mr. J. M. Gledhill's paper, read by title at the Lake Superior meeting, but presented first at the New Yolk meeting of the Iron and Steel Institute (October, 1904), and here published under a mutual agreement. Between the two Institutes. Discussion. MR. E: WINDSOR RICHARDS, Past-President, said that at a recent meeting of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers a paper was read on tool steel, and he called the attention of the members to the high-speed tool steel at the Bethlehem Works. They would have the pleasure of seeing those wonderful works and would see 60, 70, 80 and 100 tons oil lathe with half-a-dozen of these high-speed tools running. PROP. H. M. HOWE (Columbia University) said that they all looked upon these high-speed tool steels as of very great importance, particularly to the machine shop. One point occurred to hire : Had it really been shown that Swedish steel is necessary, or better than equally pure steel that is not Swedish; and is cemented steel really necessary, and is there any advantage in using that, rather than equally pure open-hearth steel'! It might be well if the author could indicate the kind of evidence on which lie bases his assertion that it is necessary to have cemented Swedish steel. Many were hoping for the development of high-speed steels from elements which exist in great quantities, such as silicon, manganese and chromium, rather than from rarer metals like molybdenum, vanadium and tungsten, the supply of which is likely to be soon exhausted. If the high-cutting speed was to last more than a generation, it. seemed to him that they would have to draw upon the common ele¬ments and not upon the rare ones. MR. Tom WESTGARTH (Middlesbrough) said he fully appreci¬ated what had been said about the advantages of using high-speed steel, because great benefit had been derived from the

Mar 1, 1905

By Frank T. Sisco

SHORTAGES of metals and minerals and substitution of less critical materials for those in which a virtual famine exists received detailed and frank discussion at a recent conference in Washington called by Robert E. McConnell, director of the Conservation Section, Office of Production Management. Representatives of the large engineering societies in the United States and O.P.M. department heads participated in the discussion. To open the session Mr. McConnell called upon Zay Jeffries, chairman of the O.P.M. Advisory Committee on Metal Conservation and Substitution, to summarize the present situation. Dr. Jeffries touched briefly on the status of metal shortages, which has already received considerable attention in the popular press, and said that much of the present difficulty was caused by the too-hasty substitution-without sufficient con¬sideration of the immediate conse¬quences-of metals having ordinarily a small yearly consumption, for those having a much larger annual consumption. As a result, all the alloying metals used in alloy-steel manufacture have become scarce, with the exception of molybdenum; further¬more, despite a reserve of 11,000 tons of molybdenum in this country and despite a normal consumption of only about 3500 tons and a prospective annual production rate of 21,000 tons by October, a shortage of molybdenum is possible before this war is over.

Jan 1, 1941

By AIME AIME

AT Williams College, in the quaint old New England town where people still go to the post office for their mail, an interesting institution has come into being as one of the aftermaths of the peace conference at Paris in 1919. The war taught the world many things about economics although much remains to be learned and more to be appreciated. B. M. Baruch, H. A. Garfield, president of Williams, and others who took part in the conference at Paris or in preparation for it, feeling that benefits would accrue from informal friendly discussion of the problems that lead to political differences between peoples, called together a summer conference in 1920. This has now become an annual affair and is coming to be looked upon as an important center for developing and stimulating public opinion. Membership in the Institute is by invitation and the lists change to correspond with the particular subjects taken up. Each year a number of distinguished foreign public men are invited to be the guests of the Institute and to meet men and women from various parts of the United States interested in their special subjects. Round tables, general conferences, and public lectures are the means employed to bring out discussion. The first are organized by groups, each including usually 25 to 40 people interested in a special subject and meeting three times a week for informal discussion. Teachers, writers, economists, engineers, business men, indeed men of all vocations and many shades of opinion, are brought together. Once a week each round table presents in general conference with the members of all other groups the more general conclusions reached in its own decisions. Afternoon and evening lectures are given by the foreign guests and these are open to the public. The lectures and the general conferences are reported widely in the press but the proceedings as a whole are not printed, no resolutions are passed, and no action is taken or contemplated. The whole plan is to furnish a forum for free discussion in hopes that the difficulties of various groups and peoples may be taken up sympathetically and good understanding promoted. There is no creed, doctrine or dogma to which the Institute is committed and widely different views are currently presented. The constant effort is to bring out points of view and the reasons for them rather than to build up convincing arguments favourable to a specific action

Jan 1, 1926

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