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By AIME AIME

IN times of stress nations pick strong men to lead them. Similarly the Coal Division selected forceful Larry A. Shipman, fuel engineer for the Southern Coal and Coke Co., Knoxville, Tenn.. to lead it through the year 1945. He was born in Indianapolis May 13, 1891. Following graduation from a technical high school in that city Larry began his fuel career approximately 35 years ago attached to one end of a scoop shovel, firing locomotives for the Pennsylvania Railroad. At the end of two years he transferred to the New York Central Lines and held these jobs successively: locomotive fireman, engineer, fireman instructor, supervisor of instructors, and fuel engineer.

Jan 1, 1945

By A. P., Svenningsen

ECONOMICAL handling of a minimum of 25,000 tons of minus 3/4-in. ore per day, grinding it to 2 per cent on 65 mesh, and effecting a high recovery of the copper at the lowest possible cost were the principal aims in the design of the new Morenci concentrating plant. Dealing with a tonnage of this magnitude, it is obvious that lost motion cannot be tolerated. When ore is carried on a conveyor an unnecessarily long distance or elevated to a greater height than necessary, or when pulp flows in a launder by a circuitous route thereby losing elevation and distance, we have lost motion which is always costly both from the standpoint of construction and operation. In addition to the 25,000 tons of ore which must be handled, 100,000 tons of water per day has to be carried through the plant in the treatment of the ore. Though water is not so difficult to handle as the ore, the combined tonnage represents a figure which could easily run into a considerable monetary loss per day if all phases of the design were not carefully followed with the idea of eliminating any unnessary handing of materials.

Jan 1, 1942

By C. H. Benedict

Largest and most important of the milling plants under construction during the year is the Morenci plant of the Phelps Dodge Corp., in Arizona, where plans are being rushed for production in 1942. Grate mills will be used for fine-grinding, and in the pilot plant, classifiers of the spiral type have the preference for the closed- circuit work. The flotation units will be chiefly of the pneumatic type, with some mechanical units as auxiliaries. The Fagergren, Pan American, and Agitair machines were left in the competition as the year closed. If the absence of European markets for finished products has dislocated the mining industry, fortunately the lack of raw materials required in the beneficiation of ores has not been serious. except possibly as to the inability to import flint grinding pebbles. Some of the less important gold mines still use pebbles for grinding as is also the practice in the comminution of nonmetallics used in various industries. T the Calumet & Hecla in the Lake A Superior copper district pebbles have been used exclusively in open- circuit grinding in the Hardinge mills treating the

Jan 1, 1941

By Mitchell, Edmund I.

VARIOUS suggestions as to proper fees for engineering services have been put forth by individual practitioners and by the American Institute of Consulting Engineers, the Connecticut Society of Civil Engineers, the Iowa Engineering Society and the Mahoning Valley (Ohio) Engineers, for the guidance of both the engineer and his client. The American Institute of Architects also has a schedule of minimum charges (revised 1908). So far as can be determined, however, the four national societies representing civil, mining, mechanical and electrical engineering have never given consideration to this question. An examination of technical periodicals published during the past decade shows that these schedules make provision for three methods of charging; i.e., (A) a percentage of the cost of the completed project; (B) a per diem rate; and (C) a fixed sum. Suggested minimum charges are as follows:

Jan 1, 1921

By PHILIP N. MOORE

IT is a pleasure to realize even at that day the dignity of the engineer's calling was upheld. May I also add my firm belief that today there be many engineers who will qualify to the specifications of our interesting author. Since that time, the development of the world has been chiefly due to the engineer, and so far as human brain can foresee, the material tasks of the future will continue to follow the directions of his judgment. Popular opinion says this is the age of the engineer; literature, which in the long run, voices public sentiment, shows it in the number of engineers who figure as characters of fiction. The engineer has been doing the big things necessary to increase the comfort and efficiency of mankind, but while a certain amount of fame and repute falls to him, too often he figures as the hired man of the entrepreneur, using that term not in the offensive sense of a mere promoter, but to mean the great visioned master of enterprise who has seen ahead of other men, recognized the coming needs of the world, and through ability to inspire others and to hire capital for his use has also been able to hire engineers as needed. Justly enough, therefore, to such men comes the fame as well as the prize of the game.

Jan 1, 1926

By JOHN R. SUMAN

COMMENCEMENT exercises this year have a peculiar significance because the graduating students are entering upon their life's work at the most critical time in the history of the United States. We are engaged in a great struggle the outcome of which is none too clear even to the best informed students of international affairs. We are starting late in a vicious world conflict where it is generally recognized that our adversaries have distinct superiority over us in armament on the land, on the sea, and in the air. We have the gigantic task of building up our armed forces and armament and at the same time supplying our allies with equipment which they must have. We can do this job if we are given sufficient time, but there is a possibility that the war will be over before we are ready. Few realize the seriousness of this situation. If this fight is to be won-and we dare not try to visualize the future of this country if it is lost-all dissension and bickering between Congress, capital, labor, and agriculture must cease. When and where voluntary co-operation proves inadequate for the successful conduct of the war effort, laws must be enacted or strengthened to achieve our purpose.

Jan 1, 1942

By F. S. McNicholas, R. L. Healy

NOTEWORTHY because of the amount of explosives used, the tonnage broken, and the wide range involved both vertically and laterally, was a large underground blast fired last November at the Hidden Creek mine, Anyox, B. C. Stoping methods and mining prac¬tices at the Hidden Creek mine have previously been described in the technical press. Earlier mining methods employed included shrinkage stoping, glory-holing, and "spiral" stoping. The latter especially has been a practice peculiar to the Granby company, having been used for years at its Phoenix mines and later at the Anyox property where conditions as to size of orebodies and strength of ground both in the ore and walls were similar. These methods all leave tremendous excavations supported at key points by pillars and braces that may only be safely mined by big blasts.

Jan 1, 1935

By AIME AIME

THE meeting" of the Rare Minerals and Metals Committee was held Monday afternoon, Feb. 17; Donald M. Lidclell, chairman, presiding. The first paper (T. P. 279), "Progress in the Use of Tantalum," by George W. Sears, was read by Mr. Smyth. Dr. Sears' paper contains an interesting summary of the uses, alloys and ores of tantalum and a resume of present method of reduction. The uses of tantalum is based on its extreme rise to the reaction of even the strong mineral acids, its great avidity for the common gases and its capacity for transforming alternating to direct current. Tantalum, as an alloy material, has received considerable study and many alloys have been reported. Among them three types appear to .be most prominent, alloys of high melting point, hard alloys and acid rising alloys. As the estimated quantity of tantalum in the earth's crust is less than that of gold, it must be looked upon as n rare metal. Australia is the greatest producer and the Black Hills of South Dakota produce minor amounts. As the one type of mineral available contains both tantalum and columbium, the extracting and metallurgy of tantalum are difficult chemical processes. Greater simplicity in this and the development of a market for columbium would undoubtedly be of great benefit to the tantalum industry, andl make for a greater use of tantalum produced.

Jan 1, 1930

By S. W. MEALS

TWENTY million people in this country and Canada in nearly four million homes can give thanks to our Creator for natural gas, that most wonderful natural fuel with which Dame Nature has so bountifully blessed us. It is a clean, healthy and cheerful fuel, made up almost entirely of carbon and hydrogen. There is no residue, no waste and there are no objectionable constituents; an ideal fuel for the home. It operates like magic, open the valve and it is there for your needs, winter or summer, night or day. You are not required to place your order 30 to 90 days in advance and you do not need to pay for your winter's supply in advance. No ashes to worry about, no flues or chimneys to clean, nor kindling wood to store or bother the housekeeper. We who have been so blessed do not realize what it would mean to be without it. If in place of opening a valve we had to go to the woodshed or coalhouse and then build our fire-carry out the ashes-well, some of us I am afraid would be late reaching our offices and perhaps would miss our hot cakes for breakfast. One cubic foot of gas produced from the White Sand formation contains 1130 B.t.u. and weighs 47/1000 lb.; there are about 24,000 B.t.u. in 1 lb. of gas. Temperatures of over 3400 deg. Fahr. have been obtained with natural gas. Not only is it a superior fuel for the home but it has no equal for use in many large manufacturing industries, especially with the making of glass, pottery and open-hearth steel. In an open-hearth furnace, properly constructed, 5000 cu. ft. will melt one ton of steel. It requires 1/3 ton of bituminous coal gasified in a producer to do the same work, or about 40 gal. of tar or fuel oil, or 11,000 cu. ft. of by-product gas.

Jan 1, 1926

By MERLE HOWARD GUISE

WHEN I was a boy I walked into Fairbanks in 1905. I was but a soft chechako, and arrived with blisters covering my feet, as a result of "mushing" the 400-mile trail on foot. Because of them, the display windows of the trading posts were first to catch my eye-dog and horse collars, harness and sled parts! And because of my enthusiasm for things adventurous, I looked long upon the prospectors' gold pans, shovels, rifles, camp equipment, and what not. Today those windows are filled with motor car accessories, tires and repair parts; yes, even thermos bottles and vacuum cleaners! There were many chance meetings with little parties of prospectors in my youth, and it always set my blood to tingling. Sometimes it was a 70-year-old sun-baked son of the Arizona desert, wrangling his stubborn, faithful jenny away from some outfitting store, at others a shovel-ended poling b0at in northern Canada, \vith the partners and the dogs towing upstream along the bank, or an old sourdough, with tug-rope around neck and hand on the spruce sapling gee-pole, mushing along behind his two or three old, plodding malamutes, dragging a little Yukon sled piled high with rusty sheet-iron stove, pick and shovel, cross-cut saw and axe, rifle, bales of dog salmon, and other paraphernalia. These meetings envisioned the panning of old creek beds and draws in the search for as yet undiscovered pay-channels; they meant the toughest kind of work sinking a hole to bedrock in some far-away valley of promise; they suggested wood fires to thaw the frozen muck and gravel and crude windlass and hand-made tub to hoist the water and the mud; but loudest of all they spoke of Adventure.

Jan 1, 1929

Jan 1, 1884

By Edward Keller

(New York meeting, February, 1912.) IN a paper, entitled A Uniform Method for the Assay of Copper Material for Gold and Silver,1 A. R. Ledoux invited the assayers of this country to contribute to a symposium, in which the results of their assays of given samples of copper-matte and metallic copper would be made comparable. This symposium 2 appeared about one year thereafter; and through it and its discussion, first became generally known the fact that the ,gold-yield by the all-fire method of assaying is usually higher than by the so-called combination (wet and dry) method, in which nitric acid is employed as a solvent for the copper. In the publication alluded to, the supposed cause of gold-losses in the latter method was declared to be the solvent action of copper nitrate, or of the reduction-products of the nitric acid, upon the gold. Up to a very recent date, gold has been held to be insoluble in pure nitric acid. (The solvent action of any chlorine present in the nitric acid must here properly be disregarded as belonging in the realm of carelessness. Among later allusions to this topic, W. R. Tan Liew 3 ascribes the solution of the gold in the combination-assay entirely to the action of nitrous acid at the high reaction-temperature of copper and nitric acid ; F. B. Flinn 4 a believes the low result in gold to be due exclusively to mechanical losses-finely-divided gold penetrating through the filter-paper-but presents no experimental data confirmative of this belief; and 0. Pufahl 5 attributes the solubility of the gold in some coppers to the presence of selenium-a view which appears to be shared by many as- 1 Trans., xxiv., 575 (1894). 2 Trans., xxv., 250 (1895). 3 Engineering and Mining Journal, vol. lxix., No. 16, p. 469 (Apr. 21, 1900). 4 Engineering and Mining Journal, vol. lxxxvii., No.11, p. 569 (Mar. 13, 1909). 5 Lunge, Chemische Technische Untersuchungs Methoden, vol. ii., p. 229 (1900).

Jul 1, 1912

By W. H. Bassett

W H. BASSETT was elected first vice-president at . the executive session of the new Board on Tues- day afternoon. Karl Eilers, H. Foster Bain, Thomas T. Read, and H. A. Maloney were respectively re-elected as treasurer, secretary, assistant secretary and assistant treasurer. The new Executive Committee will consist of W. H. Bassett, Chairman, and Richard Peters, Jr., H. C. Bellinger, E. De Golyer, Edgar Rickard. The Finance Committee will be J. V. W. Reynders, Chair- man, Henry Krumb and H. G. Moulton. George D. Barron was reappointed Chairman of the Admissions Committee, and F. Julius Fohs put in charge of the Papers and Publications Committee.

Jan 1, 1929

By F. Keller

SOME PHRASEMAKER has aptly said that nature made aluminum light but research made it strong. Research has been a vital element in the past progress of the aluminum industry and its future growth likewise depends upon the application of the results of research. The role of aluminum products in World War II is well known and this metal will certainly be increasingly important in the postwar world. Some of the principal developments in the war years were in the field of high-strength aluminum alloys. New and stronger alloys were developed which enabled designers to get increased speed and performance in our fighter planes and bombers. The aircraft industry will continue to use these new materials for peacetime passenger and cargo airplanes. High-strength alloys will also find structural applications in trucks, buses, trains, ships, and bridges.

Jan 1, 1946

By M. W. Lightner

IN 1947 the steel industry rebounded from its wartime effort and produced a record-breaking peacetime tonnage of steel ingots. During the first six months of the year the industry produced 42,000,000 tons of ingots and expected to produce 85,000,000 tons for the year. With a rated capacity of some 91,000,000 tons, production was at a rate of about 93 per cent of capacity. Credit must be extended to the steel producers who have maintained this steady state of operations while faced with many problems, not the least of which was a continued shortage of satisfactory scrap. Furthermore, the steel industry started a record-breaking peacetime expansion program at a total cost of more than $1,000,000,000. This program will increase the ingot-making capacity of the country by 2,500,000 tons and should be completed in 1948.

Jan 1, 1948

By H. Rush Spedden, Arvid Thunaes

R. R. Knobler and F. E. Albertson—Following the testwork done by Thunaes and Spedden, a Sullivan deck plant was built for the Colquiri mill. This plant started to operate in April 1945 and continues in successful operation. Since May 1950 the Colquiri mill has operated with a completely revamped flowsheet at a rate of 1000 tons per day. The old Sullivan deck section was retained with this new flowsheet. The "slime plant" in Colquiri consists of one 12-cell Denver No. 18-Sp. Sub-A flotation machine, one 16-ft and one 12-ft hydroseparator, six five-deck Sullivan-frames and six shaking tables for cleaning up the Sullivan deck concentrates, as well as 12 Deister plus three Plat-O tables on which the fine sands, which are not treated on the S-decks, are concentrated. Only —325-mesh fines are treated on the Sullivan decks. The combined hydroseparator overflows are fed to the S-decks. From 1946 to 1949, i.e. with the "old" flowsheet and an average mill feed of 800 tons per day an average of 45 tons per day was treated on four Sullivan rougher frames. The two additional frames were used as cleaners. At times, up to 90 and 120 tons of slimes were treated successfully on this Sullivan deck installation. The average operating data for the S-deck section in Colquiri for the year 1949 were as follows: The tests reported in this paper indicated a tin recovery of 42 pct. The actual plant results for 1949 show a 54 pct tin recovery from the Sullivan decks. The total average quantity of tin produced from the S-deck section in 1949 was 15 tons of tin per month. This corresponds to 3 pct of the total mill recovery. The difference between the 6 pct overall recovery-increase expected after the tests in 1943 and the actual plant results given for 1949 is explained as follows. According to the tests, a total of 170 tons was expected to be routed to the Sullivan decks, but because of certain changes in the flowsheet and mill amplifications,

Jan 1, 1951

By H. Rush Spedden, Arvid Thunaes

R. R. Knobler and F. E. Albertson—Following the testwork done by Thunaes and Spedden, a Sullivan deck plant was built for the Colquiri mill. This plant started to operate in April 1945 and continues in successful operation. Since May 1950 the Colquiri mill has operated with a completely revamped flowsheet at a rate of 1000 tons per day. The old Sullivan deck section was retained with this new flowsheet. The "slime plant" in Colquiri consists of one 12-cell Denver No. 18-Sp. Sub-A flotation machine, one 16-ft and one 12-ft hydroseparator, six five-deck Sullivan-frames and six shaking tables for cleaning up the Sullivan deck concentrates, as well as 12 Deister plus three Plat-O tables on which the fine sands, which are not treated on the S-decks, are concentrated. Only —325-mesh fines are treated on the Sullivan decks. The combined hydroseparator overflows are fed to the S-decks. From 1946 to 1949, i.e. with the "old" flowsheet and an average mill feed of 800 tons per day an average of 45 tons per day was treated on four Sullivan rougher frames. The two additional frames were used as cleaners. At times, up to 90 and 120 tons of slimes were treated successfully on this Sullivan deck installation. The average operating data for the S-deck section in Colquiri for the year 1949 were as follows: The tests reported in this paper indicated a tin recovery of 42 pct. The actual plant results for 1949 show a 54 pct tin recovery from the Sullivan decks. The total average quantity of tin produced from the S-deck section in 1949 was 15 tons of tin per month. This corresponds to 3 pct of the total mill recovery. The difference between the 6 pct overall recovery-increase expected after the tests in 1943 and the actual plant results given for 1949 is explained as follows. According to the tests, a total of 170 tons was expected to be routed to the Sullivan decks, but because of certain changes in the flowsheet and mill amplifications,

Jan 1, 1951

By E. G. Banks

THIS paper is presented in the belief that metallurgists and chemists will be interested in the practice of grinding in tube-mills in connection with stamps, especially since the records of working here given extend over a lengthy period of time (since May, 1905). The ore from the Waihi mine-more especially that produced in the upper levels-contains a large proportion of hard, chalcedonic quartz, and the gold exists in an exceedingly fine state, conditions which necessitate very fine crushing in order to ob¬tain a high extraction of the precious metal. Before the introduction of tube-mills at the 90-stamp Waihi mill, it was found necessary to stamp through 40-mesh (1,600 holes per sq. in.) woven wire-screens, having a fairly high discharge. The pulp then graded

Jan 1, 1907

By AIME AIME

THE statements quoted below range widely over the field of contact between education and industry. 'Their sources are as indicated. True Education "Education must escape from its traditional warped and narrow views as to what constitutes life and preparation for life. It must train young men and women for vigorous, wholesome development of every important element of personality. It must build physical and mental health. For each student it must inform and discipline thinking in literature, in physical, bio- logical and social sciences, and in philosophy. It must awaken appreciation of beauty.

Jan 1, 1929

By ROBERT H. BOOTH

THE happy intra-plant relationships of the Bridgeport Brass Co. are largely attributable to the interest of the management in this important business factor. In furtherance of this development Carl F. Dietz, President of the Company and a member of the Institute, has contributed the novel plan for the objective presentation of business economics, described herein. All of the officers of the corporation are active in its management and they together with many other workers filling both executive and subordinate positions have a substantial financial interest in the enterprise. The viewpoint of this organization is fairly reflected by the following quotation from Roosevelt's "The Foes of Our Own Household."

Jan 1, 1924