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Discussion of the paper of W. A. Forbes, presented at the New York Meeting, October, 1913, and printed in Bulletin No. 82, October, 1913, pp. 2477 to 2514.. SAMUEL K. VARNES,* Steelton, Pa.:-We have a gas-cleaning plant consisting of a, centrifugal dry dust catcher, and two rain-type wet scrubbing towers, 25 by 60 ft. each, for rough cleaning of blast-furnace gas. This plant was put in early in 1910, with the intention of cleaning gas for use in hot blast stoves and under boilers, and was so used for several months. Soon after it went into service, the blast-furnace men complained that they could not get as high blast temperatures as they had obtained when using dirty gas. It was decided to run a series of careful tests to determine if this were true and to what degree the apparent results might be affected by other conditions. About 60 tests were run, covering a period of five months, and at the end we came to the conclusion that it did not pay us to scrub the gas for stoves and boilers. The tests were all run upon a single stove, no boiler tests being made, but the conclusions of the stove tests being applied to the boilers. The furnace burden was practically the same for all the tests and averaged: Per Cent. Daquari and other hard ores 57 Nodules 13 Raw Mayari ore 25 Mill cinder and scale 5

Jan 12, 1913

Discussion of the paper of Norman B. Braly, presented at the Butte meeting, August, 1913, and printed in Bulletin No. 80, August, 1913, pp. 1881 to 1906. GEORGE A. PACKARD, Butte, Mont.:-I would like to ask Mr. Braly if he has any information as to the relative efficiency of the sinking pump, using it as he refers to it, discharging the exhaust into the water column or otherwise. MR. BRALY :-I have never gathered any information on that point. It is a question of getting the work done. In driving the shaft, using that method, we find it easier on the men and everything else. In the bottom of the shaft, if you exhaust back into your column, it is a quiet. shaft. Another thing is the freezing: if you are sinking with air in your pump, you will find it is liable to freeze, and in that case as the air is still under compression it will not freeze the pump. The difference is very small if there is any. But, as might be expected, the pump is a little less efficient when exhausting the air into the column. MR. PACKARD :-I suppose all of us know what a pump in the bottom of the shaft is. My experience has been, although I have no figures, that the capacity of a pump is quite considerably decreased if you are pumping, say, from a depth of 200 ft. through a No. 7 Knowles pump, when you exhaust the air into a column, but, on the other hand, it is also my impression that we can raise the water to a little greater distance. I would like to get some figures from somebody who has made actual tests.

Jan 11, 1913

Discussion of the paper of Edward Keller, presented at the Butte meeting, August, 1913, and printed in Bulletin No. 80, August, 1913, pp. 2093 to 2115. GEORGE L. HEATH, Hubbell, Mich.:-In the admirable paper quoted, is mentioned the date when the 5-g. assay was first proposed is a standard for refined metal. The author omitted, however, to mention a later paper,1 which contains a proposal for the use of a single " stock solution " of mixed acids, which has been adopted by the American Brass Co. and others. The suggestion is made that such a scheme would save time and manipulation with converter metal. Unless the low current of 0.5 ampere and the large excess of nitric acid, recommended by Mr. Keller, have been proved necessary to hold up antimony-and selenium, the use of the mixed solution which we have adopted will permit the use of 1 ampere of current per square decimeter of cathode surface, until the solutions have become colorless. At this point, we wash the covers and reduce to 0.5 ampere to prevent oxidation or contamination. The ordinary split electrodes have been used. With strong current, at least, the use of an excess of nitric acid tends to the neutralization of the solution before the end of the period, from the formation of too much ammonia., and this is detrimental. Antimony deposits more easily than arsenic, and tends to drag the latter dorm with it. There must, be some such explanation for the fact. that we have made hundreds of deposits of pure cathodes from Lake material containing no antimony, but as. high as 0.5 per cent. of arsenic. By placing an assay beaker in the Frary solenoid, or rotary device, a cathode deposit with less than 0.01 per cent. of impurity is easily obtained in one operation from 3 g. of whitneyite, carrying from 7 to 10 per cent. of arsenic. In such a case, it is necessary to test several times for end point and remove the plate as soon as no brown tint appears (at once) when hydrogen sulphide water is added to the test portion on the spot plate. Edward Keller's proportion,, of solvent figure out as 14 cc. of strong nitric to 11.4 cc. of sulphuric acid (1.84).

Jan 11, 1913

Discussion of the paper of Blarney Stevens, presented at the Butte meeting, August, 1913, and printed in Bulletin No. 79, July, 1913, pp. 1285 to 1303. F. L. GRAMMER,Leesburg, Va. (communication to the Secretary*):¬ Mr. Stevens refers to an explanation of parallel jointing by W. 0. Crosby, which I noted when reading one of his excellent text books. It seemed to me earthquakes were not a satisfactory explanation, and I looked up several authorities; but I never realized how small the usual amplitudes were until Mr. Stevens presented his paper. Several letters to the U. S. Geodetic Survey showed me there were very few records of tidal movements of earth crust in the United States. Altitude and latitude would be influencing factors; but this diurnal movement must exceed earthquake amplitudes, besides being more nearly universal. My inquiries brought the answer that the major directions of jointing had not been extensively tabulated. If major directions of jointing were recorded-with notes as to angle with mountain chain, or North Star, and distance between joints, with nature of rock and maximum and minimum tidal up-heaval-some interesting relations might be made manifest.

Jan 11, 1913

Discussion of the paper of E. G. Woodruff, presented at the Butte meeting, August, 1913, and printed in Bulletin No. 78, June, 1913, pp. 1001 to 1010. F. A. LINFORTH, Butte, Mont.:-I have not had an opportunity of reading this paper thoroughly, but I would like to call attention to the possible use of the contours on fault planes. It is obvious that if the contours of fault surfaces call be determined, we will be able to determine the axes of the hollows in the fault surface. It seems probable, and there are examples to point to the accuracy of, the assumption, that the axes of these hollows may be the direction of movements on the faults, and if that is true it will aid materially in locating faulted ore bodies or the shoots of ore on the opposite sides of faults. A few such contour maps of faults have been attempted on some of the faults of the Butte district, and those faults which are believed to have the nearly normal movement exhibit for the axes of these hollows a line nearly up and down in the plane of the fault, but in those cases where the throw is believed to bee nearly horizontal we find that the axes of the hollows are almost horizontal lines. In other words, the movements on faults, I believe, would be more nearly indicated by the larger grooves in the fault surfaces than by the small slickensides and minor hollows that are seen, so that contour maps might be valuable in geology in that way. C. W. GOODALE, Butte, Mont.:-I received a letter from Mr. Woodruff asking me to take part in the discussion of his paper, but I have not had time to give the paper any study. I can certainly add my opinion to that of all the engineers here that the topographic maps of the government are of great aid to the engineer. When I visit a new district, the first thing I do is to see if that district has been covered by the U. S. Geological Survey avid if topographic map has been issued. And I find that some of the younger engineers frequently come into my office to see if I have such maps. I know in some cases the reports made out by engineers contain copies of these topographic maps, or clippings from them. I am sure that. the topographic maps furnished by the government are of very great value to our engineers.

Jan 11, 1913

Discussion of the paper of S. E. Bretherton, presented at the Butte meeting, August, 1913, and printed in Bulletin No. 80, August, 1913, pp. 1481 to 1487. S. E., BRETHERTON, San Francisco, Cal.:-Since preparing my paper, our chemist, F. L. Wilson, has been experimenting with Leadville, Colo., oxidized zinc ore and Leadville zinc sulphides containing lead, operating upon 40-1b. lots at a time. His results on Leadville sulphides are as follows: The raw ore contained a trace of gold, 5.04 oz. of silver, 19.1 per cent of zinc, and 7.24 per cent of lead. After roasting the ore contained a trace of gold, 5.72 oz. of silver, 0.75 per cent of copper, 21.7 per cent of zinc, and 8.29 per cent of lead. The loss in weight by leaching was 38.8 per cent. The extraction was 42.8 per cent of the copper, 80.6 per cent of the zinc, 7.1 per cent of the lead, 0.64 per cent of the silver, and no gold. The little .silver that is extracted would be thrown down with the copper when precipitating it from the zinc and both thrown hack into the residue to be smelted. There would be no trouble in smelting the residue with nearly all the sulphur eliminated and containing less than 7 per cent. of zinc. On zinc carbonates containing silicates the results are not satisfactory. H. O. HOFMAN, Boston, Mass. (communication to the Secretary*) :¬The paper by Mr. Bretherton upon the application of ammonia and carbonic acid to the recovery of zinc as oxide from roasted sulphide ore is of interest to me, as the first installation of the Schnabel process for the extraction of zinc from a mixture of zinc oxide, lead oxide (with some cupric oxide), and pellets of enriched lead, produced in steaming liquated zinc-silver-lead crust of the Parkes process, was made at Lautenthal, Harz mountains, where I was chemist. In that capacity I carried out numerous experiments on the Schnabel process, was active in the erecting of the plant, and later had charge of it. After the Lautenthal plant had been in operation for some time a similar one was built at Hoboken-les-Anvers, but both have been abandoned, as the wet process could not compete with the distillation of the liquated zinc-silver-lead crust, now used universally in the Parkes process.

Jan 11, 1913

Discussion of the paper of Robert H. Richards, presented at the Butte meeting, August, 1913, and printed in Bulletin No. 81, September, 1913, pp. 2299 to 2303. C. D. DEMOND, Anaconda, Mont. (communication to the Secretary*) :-Any one who has observed the increased efficiency of the Wilfley tables in a mill when fed from a reasonably good hydraulic classifier, as compared with tables fed from a spitzkasten., which is a very poor classifier, will agree to the advantage of ? better classification." It must be gratifying to Dr. Richards to know that, directly or indirectly, maim mill men are responding to his persistent advocacy of correct principles of ore dressing and are accepting the results of his investigations. As he says, these principles mean much for both the conservation of resources and the profit of operators. When Dr. Richards gives us accurate figures as to the maximum size of free mineral grains in the tailings of the Wilfley table and of the vanner, they will be of a good deal of practical value in delimiting the proper fields for the Wilfley, the vanner, and the round table. He has coined the terms ? free settling" and "hindered settling."' The series may be completed by adding "crowded settling," the main principle of action on both the vanner and the Wilfley table, which is the principle of separation in a mass of grains crowded as closely together as they can be and yet continue free to move between one another; and the occurrence of larger mineral particles in the Wilfley tailing than in that from the vanner is apparently caused by the more violent agitation, due chiefly to the purposely sudden reversal of the stroke. It seems likely that the agitation caused by the wash water dropping directly upon the concentrate on the vanner is more harmful than that due to the shake. For the very finest material that can be concentrated by usual methods, the round table is superior to the vanner because it does not, have even, the gentle agitation of the latter. The action on round tables is, not crowded settling," but "film sizing," 2 but agitation is harmful in the latter action. George Gates proved this harm 20 years ago : in slaking the first successful large-scale application of canvas tables in California gold mills he abandoned all shaking motion, although he had patented canvas tables to which such motion was applied.

Jan 11, 1913

Discussion of the paper of Frederick W. Apgar, presented at the Butte meeting, August, 1913, and printed in Bulletin No. 7S, June, 1913, pp. 1011 to 1022. L. C. GRATON, Cambridge, Mass.:-I presume I am one of the few who are exceedingly interested in microscopic work, and I am sure we have all enjoyed this paper very much. I will not attempt to express my own feelings in regard to it beyond saying that it seems to me that this sort of investigation and study has been overlooked and slighted, and its possibilities are very great. There are one or two, details which impressed me, because they were novel to me, and one was the development of secondary galena with dull luster. I have never seen any galena which seemed to be secondary, and have never seen any that was secondary or primary that did not have a bright luster. KIRBY THOMAS, New York, N. Y. (communication to the Secretary *) :-The present-day mining engineer is expected to " see into the ground farther than the point of the pick " and he is justified in making free claim to his ability to do so. Mr. Apgar has recorded the development of the application to the work of the engineer of a very useful but tardily recognized instrument-the petrographic microscope, an instrument which is helping to shatter the proverbial "point of' the pick" limitation-and he has shown its use and its possibilities very clearly. Some further field examples of the use of the microscope in engineering problems may add to the appreciation of Mr. Apgar's scholarly paper. In exploration by diamond drills in the Sudbury, Ontario, nickel district it is often of great importance to determine when the drill has passed out of the norite and into the foot-wall formation. Structural calculations may give a clue to the expected point of contact, but the variations are considerable, and, since to stop the drill before reaching the contact is futile, and too continue beyond it is needless, it becomes of theoretic and economic importance to determine positively the lithological nature of the corer at critical stages in the work. In some places the foot-wall is an earlier norite, only distinguishable from the nickel norite (Sudbury-: ite), by means of an examination of the rock slides with a petrographic; microscope. Again, certain diabase dikes which cut the norite and. the foot-wall formations cannot be easily or with certainty distin-

Jan 11, 1913

Discussion of the paper of Frederick Laist, presented at the Butte meeting, August, 1913, and printed in Bulletin No. 79, July, 1913, pp. 1147 to 1162. J. C. DICK, Salt Lake City, Utah :-I would like to ask Mr. Laist why a 10 per cent. salt solution was used. MR. LAIST :-The reason for using salt in the solution is to get .the sulphur. The solution of dilute sulphuric acid has no solvent action on the sulphur even after roasting, and the addition of the salt is made primarily to dissolve the sulphur chlorides. MR. DICK:-I would like to ask also if you made any experiments as to grinding fine your calcines, rather than leaving the coarse material. MR. LAIST :-We have not made any experiments along those lines except in the laboratory, but the objections which we have to grinding are that the difficulties of roasting are very much greater when roasting finely ground material than when roasting coarse material, and the difficulties of leaching are somewhat increased; the percolating system is simpler and easier to manipulate, particularly when acid solutions are used, so that we prefer from our experience not to grind. STUART CROASDALE,* Denver, Colo. (communication to -the Secretary +) :-In order to meet the conditions involved in his ore-treatment problem, Mr. Laist has developed a very interesting and apparently successful metallurgical hybrid which he calls the oxychloridizing roast. The lower floors of the MacDougall furnaces are made to accomplish what used to be done on the " cooling floor" in the old days of salt roasting and " hypo " or brine leaching of silver ores.

Jan 11, 1913

Discussion of the paper of Ralph Hayden, presented at the Butte meeting,. August, 1913, and printed in Bulletin No. 80, August, 1913, pp. 1443 to 1467. JOHN V. N. Done, Denver, Colo.:-Mr. Hayden has placed the metallurgical profession greatly in his debt .for this valuable paper. The importance of such a complete description of the research work on which is based the building of a plant to add at least 10,000,000 lb. of copper per year to the production of the Anaconda Copper Mining Co., at small expense, will be appreciated by all our members, and especially those who are facing similar problems. The information given in regard to the treatment methods discarded will be a great help to many workers, as it is often of as much importance to know what ? not to do" as what method to adopt. I Some further comment on the tests of the Dorr thickener may be of interest, as they have led to developments which I believe will prove of great importance. Before the Dorr thickener was installed, I had shown Mr. Laist reports from the Steptoe Valley concentrator, in which it was stated that one thickener 17 ft. in diameter was the equivalent in settling capacity of twelve 8-ft. cones, although the latter-contained double the surface area.. Mr. Laist, had made careful tests on the settling capacity of in 8-ft. cone on Anaconda slime, and we naturally expected the thickener would show a much higher capacity for equivalent area. When, is Mr. Hayden stated, the tests showed no increase, I realized that we were comparing it with a cone under test conditions, while the Steptoe results were based on operative conditions, find the explanation given by Mr. Waddell for the great difference had been, that " there is only one unit to watch instead of twelve, without the constant result of feed to twelve cones becoming unbalanced. Also the one 1 1/8-in. spigot used on the Dow requires no attention compared with the dozen 3/8-in. spigots of the cones.' I realized also as a. result of the tests that the total settling area required to handle the immense tonnage of the Anaconda company would be enormous, and very expensive in view of the housing required by Montana climatic conditions. After studying the matter over, I told Mr. Laist that I believed a thickener operating in a much shallower tank would have nearly the same capacity. I asked him to test it out in the same tank filled 3 ft. deep, and stated that if my idea

Jan 11, 1913

By P. H. Griffin

WHEN a subject, such as the manufacture and service of chilled car wheels, as has been fruitlessly discussed for ten or fifteen years, it is difficult to revive interest and action by the mere repetition of statements and arguments that have been made before. And when a situation involves serious responsibilities for conditions that have grown up under circumstances beyond the control of any particular individuals or authority, it is even more difficult to deal with. But there is one phase of every subject that need not involve these particular points if presented in a, proper manner; and that is, " the future state." I will try to present the subject of this communication from the latter standpoint and with the hope that all of those interested will feel disposed to give the matter attention from the basis that it is a, vitally important one to all that travel on railroads, whether as employees or officials, or as dependent on those in charge of the operation, or in the matter of materials and equipment used. The conditions of chilled wheel service have been changed so radically in the past ten or fifteen years by the use of freight cars of 40 and 50 tons capacity, that it is fair to say in the interest of all concerned in the use and in the manufacture of such wheels, that the increased strains and loads have been quite sufficient to account for much of the service results that have transpired. That proper provision was not made for increased possibilities of strength and wear, in fact that previous factors of the kind were allowed to deteriorate, is no proof that such wheels cannot be made equal to heavy service conditions as shown in the data given herein.

Jan 10, 1913

By W. A. Forbes

by the combustion of this gas as it reached the air was a familiar sight in the days when open-top furnaces were in vogue. As blast-furnace practice progressed, however, involving the use of hot blast and the development of power from the gas, blast-furnace construction was modified to conserve this gas for heating hot-blast stoves, raising steam under boilers, and various miscellaneous purposes. When the use of blast-furnace gas was extended to the driving of gas engines, the necessity for thoroughly cleaning the gas became apparent., and soon the advantages of also properly cleaning the gas for use in stoves and udder boilers became more fully recognized.

Jan 10, 1913

By Ralph Wilcox

THE diamond drilling of certain characters of unstable rock forma-tion, as, for example, the copper-bearing schists of the Miami district in Arizona, is rendered most difficult by what is known as " caving" of the sides of the drill holes. As this caving is very greatly increased by the action of flowing water, it occurred to me, after experiencing a great deal of difficulty with caving in diamond-drill holes which I was drilling for the Miami Copper Co., that if I could substitute air for water, much of the caving-with resultant difficulties, such as decreased speed of sinking and increased consumption. of diamonds-would be overcome. After some experimenting, I found that it was perfectly practicable to substitute air for the water; forcing the air down the hollow rotating rods in the same manner as is done with water, the air passing out around the bit, which is thus cooled, and ascending on the outside of the rods to the collar of the hole, carrying the borings in just as satisfactory a manner as had been done by the water, but without the accompanying destruction or caving of the sides of the drill holes such as had been so generally experienced with the water. When water was encountered in the drilling this water was forced up to the collar just as it would have been had water been used in the .drilling, but with the correspondingly decreased flow there was relatively less washing or caving of the sides of the drill holes. The only change necessary in the arrangement of the drill is that a cross instead of a tee is used at the collar of the hole. A tightly woven jute bag is attached to one arm of the cross, for collecting and filtering the sample; and when drilling in dry ground a jet of water is attached to the opposite arm of the cross, to collect the dust and wash down the sample into the bag. The rods rotate through a stuffing box attached to the upper opening of the cross. The distention of the jute bag by the issuing air indicates the operating conditions as sufficiently as did the flow of water when using water in the drill hole.

Jan 10, 1913

By V 7. 0 / 300 dpi

WHEN the copper smelters were built, in Montana, all of the refractory products which were used in their construction were shipped in from Eastern factories. It was apparent that if a material suitable for the manufacture of these products could be found within the State, a saving of freight could be effected and a new industry built up. Prospecting for such materials was started and experiments were made with samples from numerous deposits. Considerable effort and funds were expended in an attempt to manufacture silica brick from Dillon quartz, a light colored sandstone that is found near Dillon, Mont., on the Oregon Shortline railroad. As a brick material the Dillon quartz was a failure, but it has proved very satisfactory as a silica cement. It is now being used in laying silica brick and for reverberatory furnace bottoms. A bed of quartzite that is particularly suited to the manufacture of high-grade silica brick -was finally discovered at Browns Spur, 6 miles west of Anaconda. The material from this deposit is now being used in the manufacture of the Anaconda silica brick, which have gained a wide reputation for heat-resisting and lasting qualities. The analysis of all average sample of this quartz is: SiO2,, 96.7; Fe203, 0.3; Al203, 2.5; CaO, 0.3 per cent. The very low percentage of fluxing ingredients makes this a most refractory material. All of the Anaconda silica brick are hand molded. Various types of brick machines have been tried, but the hand-mold process proved the best suited to the manufacture of silica brick from this material. The silica is first put through a jaw crusher and is then clumped into wet pans, where 4 per cent. of lime paste is added, to produce a bond. Without the lime the. material would not be plastic enough to mold. After a few minutes' grinding in the wet pans the material is conveyed to the molder, who forces it into the molds by hand. The brick are then dumped on pallets and placed in the drier, where they are left until dry enough to be set in the kilns. Some of the brick are re-pressed before being dried. They are burned about five days, in round down-draft kilns. It is not necessary to have as much heat in the kilns as the brick will be subjected

Jan 9, 1913

By W. H. Andrews

THE constantly increasing consumption of Portland cement in the State makes the above subject of partlcular interest at this time. The increasing demand is due to the rapid settling of the country and the fact that new uses are being found frequently for the above named commercial article. The industry is one that is bound to grow as the population increases, and this being the case, it may be well ,it this time to consider briefly- the matter of the chemical and physical com-position of proper raw materials. A cement mixture is one that contains approximately 75 per cent. carbonate of lime, 15 per cent. Silica, and 5 to 7 per cent. alumina, and iron oxides; the other elements being magnesium carbonate and small quantities of the rarer elements general associated with limestone deposits. It call be readily seen from the above composition that it is possible to build up this mixture from a number of different materials. First.-A rock high in carbonate of lime can be mixed with clay or shale in such proportions as to bring about the desired composition ; the chief difficulty in the building up of such a mixture is that it is hard to find a clay or shale in which the silica-alumina, ratio lies .between 4 to 1 and 3 to 1 and at the same time shows physical characteristics which will make certain its adaptability to the practical manufacture of Portland cement. Very often clays or shales are found which are right chemically but contain large quantities of grit or free silica. Such clays or shale must be ground to extreme fineness in the mixture in order to make the silica and alumina combine with the lime when the mixture is burned. On the other hand, clays or shales are often found that have the proper physical characteristics but in which the amount of alumina, is too great.

Jan 9, 1913

By John Hall

THE recently announced run of three years, nine months and eleven days made by a. crucible steel melting furnace of the Columbia Tool Steel Co., which is claimed as a. world's record, brings forcibly to our attention the great improvements that have been made in the design, construction and operation of the Siemen's regenerative crucible- melting furnace since its introduction in this country. Credit for this advance should be given to the furnace designer, the manufacturer of refractories, and the operators of the furnaces, whose persistent efforts and intelligent co-operation in attacking the problem have resulted so satisfactorily. There are three factors that determine the life of a crucible furnace, or any other furnace for that matter : Design, nature of refractories and conditions of operation; (including the nature of steel melted) and to some extent these factors are interdependent. Thus, for instance, if a crucible furnace is to lie operated single turn and allowed to cool off considerably at night, in order to save fuel, the use of clay-brick melting holes may be advisable, since silica brick is not well adapted to endure rep eated heating and cooling. But the total life of a clay-brick melting hole is necessarily short. Again, if local conditions such as danger of flood make necessary the building of the furnace largely above ground, so that the radiation of beat is promoted, the cooling down of the furnace over the week ends, when no steel is melted, will be considerable-and the contraction of the furnace that results tends to wrack it to pieces. The character of the metal being melted affects the life of the furnace to a great extent. Low-carbon steels and steels made from iron and charcoal require higher temperatures and much longer melting tune than high-carbon steel or steel made largely from scrap; the life of the furnace will be shorter, and the number of heats melted will be much less, when such materials are melted.

Jan 9, 1913

By W. L. Saunders

IMPORTANCE OF ROCK DRILLING. IT has been estimated that the value of the mineral products of the United States is about $2,000,000,000 a year; that about $25,000,000 is expended. annually for explosives and that about double this sum is paid in wages where blasting is done. The value of the mineral products does not adequately express the importance of the industry involved in the excavation of rock and ore because of the enormous sums of money expended in tunnel driving, in quarries, and in open-cut excavation generally. We know that the Catskill Aqueduct in the neighborhood of New York, which is now nearing completion, has cost some $165,000,000 and that about one-third of this may be rated as rock excavation. These illustrations are given in order to call attention to the great importance of an industry the extension and development of which in our industrial life depend so much upon the economics of rock drilling. Reference has been made to the new Catskill Aqueduct. There are three aqueducts leading into New York, each built at periods separated by some 20 years of time. 'The first one, known as the Old Aqueduct, conveys the waters of the Croton river to New York City in a manner which reminds one of the old Roman aqueducts, the ruins of which are still in evidence. The engineers who laid out these old conduits sought to direct their lines around the hills and into the valleys, at all times avoiding the rock. When it was necessary to cross a river or a deep ravine, a bridge or causeway was constructed. High Bridge, over the Harlem river, is an arched masonry viaduct differing in no essential features from the aqueducts of the Romans. When the second Croton Aqueduct was built, about the year 1890, the art of drilling rock had been so far perfected, and the use of explosives, through the invention of dynamite, had become ,so general, that this waterway was planned and executed on straight lines, following rather than avoiding the rock. The second Croton Aqueduct is a tunnel through rock, about 32 miles in length; material gneiss, almost as hard as granite. Its construction was made practicable by sinking

Jan 9, 1913

By Norman Braly

THE following is not offered as an extended paper on the subject of shaft sinking, but more as a description of the present practice of shaft sinking in the Butte district. The Anaconda company is sinking at present the following shafts: Badger State, Moose, Mountain Consolidated, Mountain View, Pennsyl-ania and Tropic. At the High Ore and Leonard mines the shafts are being deepened by sinking two compartments and will subsequently be enlarged to the full working size by raising alongside the compartments which are now being sunk. The following other companies are also sinking shafts: Butte-Alex Scott, Butte and Zenith City, Boston and Corbin, North Butte Mining Co. (at the Granite Mountain shaft), East Butte Co. (at the Pittsmont shaft), and the Rainbow Lode Development Co. Shaft Timbering. The shafts of the Butte district, generally speaking, are of three compartments arranged in a straight line, and the pump compartment is usually arranged for the use of an auxiliary hoisting cage, as well as for carrying pipe lines and electric wires. The Rainbow shaft is practically square, and of three compartments. The length of the shafts outside of timber will vary from 17 to 22 ft., and the width from 6 ft. 6 in. to 7 ft. Fir timber is used in all shaft work. This may be obtained from the Coast, when it is known as Coast fir, or from Idaho or Montana, when it is known as native fir. The native fir seems to be the tougher wood, but it is hard to obtain clear lumber in the lengths and sizes necessary for shaft work. Some of the shaft timber of the Anaconda company has been treated with creosote as a preservative, but this practice has not come into general use, as the ground of the camp is so heavy that the timbers usually crush before they rot. The size of timber most .used for shaft work is 12 by 12 in., while 10 by 12 in., 10 by 14 in. and 12 by 14 in. are used for some of the special pieces around the shaft. The new Leonard shaft is timbered with 14 by 14 in. wall plates throughout.

Jan 8, 1913

By E. E. Brownson

THIS paper will be confined to the treatment of methods as applied in the laboratory of the Boston and Montana Reduction Department of the Anaconda Copper Mining Co. at Great Falls, Mont. As the electrolytic plant of this company operates at a current density of approximately 35 to 40 amperes per square foot when running up to capacity, the arsenic and antimony content of the anodes delivered to the, plant is of considerable importance as bearing on the purity of the refined cathodes turned out. Owing to the rather high relative percentage of antimony, it has always been the custom to determine antimony as well as arsenic in all forms of copper. Thus, anodes have been analyzed in which the antimony was about equal to the arsenic although the average shows about 2 parts of arsenic to 1 of antimony. In the refined copper the relative proportions of the two impurities vary considerably, but probably in the average are about equal. In this latter case, the percentage of the two is so small that ordinarily no attempt is made to separate them, the report of analysis showing percentage of As and Sb combined. Although rapid and exceedingly accurate determinations of arsenic may be made by means of various distillation schemes, the determination of antimony, either by itself or together with arsenic, has always been more or less cumbersome and has required a considerable amount of time. By the methods, details of which follow, the determination of arsenic and antimony, either separated as in the case of anodes or together in case of refined copper, is accomplished in 24 hr. from the time the sample is received by the chemist.

Jan 8, 1913

By Edgar Dunn

PART I.-DETERMINATION OF GASES IN SMELTER FLUES. IN 1907, upon arriving in Anaconda to take up work in the testing department of the Washoe Reduction Works, the. following problem was met at the car step, so to speak: complete and. exact analysis of gases, not only at the stack, but also in all departmental flues. Taken up to employ time not otherwise needed for regular testing department work, instructions were extremely liberal for a commercial plant, to the effect that accuracy should not be sacrificed to speed. In December, 1907, the work was temporarily transferred to the Great Falls Smelter, and some of the methods here given were there worked out. Differences in smelting operations at Great Falls and Anaconda, however, necessitated further investigations and the development of a new method for S03 determinations at the latter plant, where work was resumed in July, 1908, and completed about a year later. At the time of inception of the work, data (not only on percentages, but even on methods) were found to be meager in the extreme, for one or the other of two reasons: either entire lack of experiment at a large proportion of smelters, or disinclination on the part of the managements to divulge data of any description pertaining to either results or methods. In making determinations of gaseous constituents of flues, two methods are open to consideration: 1, the drawing out of a sample, and collection of the same as a whole, to be removed to the laboratory for later analysis; and 2, the absorption in situ on the flue of one certain constituent, disregarding others for the time being, or perhaps combining two or three in one determination. The first is generally the more rapid, but it is also the more inaccurate, method of analysis, even with special type absorption apparatus, being the more largely subject to error, both of reading, and also because of leakage during complicated manipulation in the laboratory. The amount used for analysis must also, because of limit of container, be small for the first method, and an average gas is very seldom obtained, necessitating for a fair average result a large number of determinations. Consequently, when we balance the time spent in a dozen determinations of short-time samples as against the time employed in making two or three long-time determinations of various constituents in situ, we are not so certain in our statement as to the relative speed of the two methods. Moreover, the method of analysis in the laboratory of 100 cc. of flue gas is satisfactory only when constituents thus determined are present in considerable quantity, results being simply approximate when determining such compounds as sulphur dioxide, sulphur trioxide, carbon monoxide and dioxide, and arsenic trioxide and water vapor, none of which are carried in all smelter flues in amounts in excess of (or even approaching) 1 per cent by volume. Special condi-

Jan 8, 1913