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By R. W. Raymond

The important question of the metallurgical value of the coals of the Rocky Mountains and the Pacific Coast is to be settled, of course, by practical experiment. Meanwhile, as I have had occasion to point out, the proximate analyses of these coals throws little light upon it, and is, indeed, likely to mislead the metallurgist, if he compares it with the results of similar analyses upon bituminous and semi-bituminous coals. With the view of showing how large a proportion of the material usually classed as(" volatile matters " consists of combined water, or oxygen and hydrogen presumably in chemical combination, I have collected a number of ultimate analyses from various sources, in the following tables. The numbered analyses in the first table are as follows: No. 1. Monte Diabolo coal—Analyst, H. S. Munroe, Col. School of Mines. 2. Weber Canon, Utah, " " " 3. Echo Canon, " " " " 4. Carbon Stat'n, Wyoming, " " " 5. " " " " " 6. Coos Bay, Oregon, " " " 7. Alaska, " " " 8. " " " " 9. Canon City, Colorado, " Dr. T. M. Drown, Philadelphia. 10. Baker Co., Oregon, " " " 11. Blockcoal,SandCr'k,Ind., " Prof. E. T. Cox. This table affords some suggestive comparisons, to facilitate which a remark or two, explanatory of its construction, will be useful. In the ultimate analysis of coals, the proportions are frequently calculated (as, for instance, in the report for 1872 of Prof. Cox, State

By H. M. Chance

The failure of the carbonic acid gas method at the Kehley Run Colliery has given rise to a conviction of the inefficienoy of the process ; but a careful survey of the facts, and of the conditions under which it was tried, mill show that a fair trial of the method was not and could not be made at this colliery; its failure in this particular instance therefore, should not be held as evidence against, the process. In itself, thc method seems to be theoretically perfect, but in prac-

Jan 1, 1881

By T. Egleston

There has alrvays been atheory among those working placer mines that gold is both folind rusty," and becomes so under treatment, hy which they nleun, not that gold becomes coated with oxide: of gold, but that it, is either coated superficially or alloyed with some substsnee which prevents the contact with mercury,and thus precludenthe possibility of amtrlgamation. To such aoiiditions of the

Jan 1, 1881

By B. W. Frazier

At a recent meeting of the North of England Institute of Min ing and Mechanical Engineers, during a discussion upon the com pression of air, attention was called to an apparent anomaly in the phenomena attending the compression. At a subsequent meeting this apparent anomaly was explained by Prof. Herschel, and all the facts observed shown to be strictly in accordance with the laws of thermodynamics. Upon reading the report of the discussion in the published transactions of the society, it occurred to me that an attempt to determine mathematically the amounts of energy (whether in the form of heat or of work) expended and absorbed in compressing air, and causing it to perform work by expansion, might prove of use to some who have not access to any treatise upon the application of the laws of thermodynamics to the compression of air, and who have not the time or the inclination to make such application for themselves. The apparent anomaly noticed was this: If air be compressed, and at the same time, by the sufficient application of a cooling medium, kept at a constant temperature, the indicator diagrams in the

By Thomas M. Drown

At the meeting of the Istitote in New York, in February, 1880," I described a process of determining sulphur iu metallic allphides, with especial reference to the determination of pyrites in coal. The procem, as then described, is as follows: A solution of sodium hydrate, of 1.25 specific gravity, is saturated with bromine. If an excess of bromiue is used it must be neutralized by the addition of a little more sodium hydrate. The pulverized mineral or coal is moistened with 25 c.e. of this solution autl heated, then hydrochloric acid is added cautiously to just acid reaction. This operation is repeated with another 25 c.c. of the alkaline solution, and again rendered acid. The mixture should be kept hot. The contents of the beaker or dish are then

Jan 1, 1881

By H. Martyn Chance

I have been induced to present this paper to the Institute because I have been unable to find any publication containing a disctission of this subject. In some of our technical schools and colleges the student is required to construct or copy (generally the latter) a number of profile sections as part of his routine work; but little attention is given to the methods of projecting observed dips and exposures upon the section line, and still less to the method of constructing the under (or above) ground curves. As a result of this lack of instruction every engineer or geologist is compelled to invent for himself a system, or copy the style of others. Geological profile sections have frequently been used to determine underground structure from data obtained at the surface, but the experience of engineers in the anthracite coal-fields has shown that they are to be relied upon only in exceptional instances. The possibility of indicating underground curvatures from dipangles observed at the surface has been found to be limited to a mere approximation of the larger flexures, As a means of predicting the depth and shape of minor rolls, they have been found most unsatisfactory. In the anthracite coal-fields the hypothecated

Jan 1, 1881

By B. Fernow

The question of preserving the forests in this country is an impor tant one, not only to trades using wood but to the whole nation, and though agitated for many years has not received that general consid eration which its broad bearing demands. Those who are interested in and working for reform in the treat ment of American forests are looking to the government for help, suggesting the creation of a commission to study the conditions of forests at home and abroad, and hope that a sound system of manag ing the woodlands will be thereby inaugurated. This reform will cost time and money, all the more because the government can bring to bear upon private owners hardly any power but that of good example and encouragement. There is, however, another aspect of the question to which I wish to draw your attention, namely; the more economical use of the valuable material which our forests offer, a more careful and ex haustive utilization of its constituents in all cases where wood or its products are applied. The wasteful consumption of wood in the United States is in every way so enormous as to justify the statement that by merely adopting an economical husbandry in this particular the destruction of forests might be delayed for many years, while the neglect of this imperatively needed and immediately practicable reform deprives legislative remedies of much of their value. In this regard I wish to draw the attention of metallurgists, especially those who are in terested in the manufacture of charcoal iron, to a more economical and profitable use of wood in iron manufacture. For thousands of years of human history wood was the main, nay, the only material used for fuel. Mineral coal came into use only in the fourteenth century, and it is only recently that it has largely displaced its less carbonaceous predecessor as fuel. The art of concentrating carbon in the form of charcoal for easier transportation and readier use in distant places was, according to Pliny, known to the ancients long before Christ., and was practiced in all countries, especially in connection with the iron-manufacture.

Jan 1, 1879

By John C. Smock

The fire-clays of New Jersey belong in two geological ages, the cretaceous and quaternary, or post-tertiary. Three very small deposits of plastic clays have been discovered within the limits of the Archæan rocks. These are not refractory and of little importance, excepting in a geological consideration. They have resulted from a decomposition of the feldspars of the rock in situ, and they have been classified as inferior kaolins.

Jan 1, 1879

By T. Egleston

The origin of gold both in placer deposits ancl in veins, and especially the origin of nuggets, has been the subject of repctated discussions and investigations, which have been recently brought to my attention by several extremely interesting specinlens sent to me for examination, and mare especially by the one exhibited at the meeting of the Institute in February, 1880.* In the year 1874 I made some exan~inations of the hydraulic mines of California, and was very nluoh struck with the distribution of the gold throughout these deep placers, which were almost invariably poor on'the surface, while gradually growing richer towards the bedrock. The constant presence of fossil wood, and the large quantity of organic matter contained even low down in these beds, was also remarkable. Not being satisfied with the various theories advanced to account for the formation of these deposits, I began an investigation early in the pear 1879 on the conditions of solubility of gold and the causes of the loss in working gold ore in a large way. The researclles which I have undertaken show that gold must be considered a soluble rather than an insoluble metal, and that the conditions of solution are such as will be found anywhere where gold is likely to occur, and the solution may take place even under the ordinary circumstuncee of surfiace drainage, and may be going on freely even where the presence of gold has never been suspected, and that there are causee enough in nature to produce the solution of the gold in sufficient quantities to account for all the phenomena of both the vein and placer formations. The general theory with regard' to the formation of these placer deposits and nuggets has been that they were the result of the deatruction of pre-existing. vein-matter, which does not accord with the fitcts as sholvn in the deep placer deposits. The gold in such case would be distributed in layers of unequal richness throughout

Jan 1, 1881

By T. Sterry Hunt

In my address on the " Geognostical Relations of the Metals," delivered before the Institute on the 20th of February last (Vol. I Transactions, p. 331), I spoke of the rocks in the vicinity of Thunder Bay, Lake Superior, where I indicated two series of uncrystalline rocks resting upon the Huronian schists, the lower one consisting of dark-colored argillites and sandstones overlaid, apparently in slight discordance, by nearly horizontal red and white sandstone and marls, which were compared with those of Sault Ste. Marie, and those of the Portage Lake district, on the south shore. These latter sandstones, according to Brooks and Pumpelly, overlie uncomformably the Keweenaw series of copper-bearing amygdaloids, sandstones, and conglomerates, and are in turn overlaid by the Trenton limestone. I then proposed to call this lower series of Thunder Bay, that is to say, the dark-colored argillites and sandstones which are traversed by the silver-bearing lodes of that region, the Animikie group. Shortly after the publication of that address I received an abstract of a paper on the geology of that region by Professor Robert Bell, read before the Montreal Natural History Society, February 24th. He there confirms the statement made in my address that the gold of Lake Shebandowan occurs in the Huronian, which is also seen to be cut by the silver-bearing lodes just mentioned. Professor Bell, in this paper, proposes to designate both what I have called the Animikie group, and the overlying red and white sandstones, by the name of the Nepigon group, for the reason that the upper series is best displayed about Lake Nepigon. This latter series is by Logan supposed to be overlaid by the copper-bearing amygdaloids with conglomerates and sandstones of the north shore (apparently identical with those of Keweenaw); and the whole together, inclnding the Animikie group, constitute his Upper Copper-bearing group. These copper-bearing strata are by him supposed to be overlaid by the red and white sandstones of St. Mary, which are apparently the same with those sandstones which, according to Brooks and Pumpelly, overlie unconformably the similar cupriferous rocks of Portage Lake, and are, in their turn, overlaid by the Trenton limestone. Thus the sandstones which at Thunder Cape overlie the Animikie group are by Logan placed in the midst of the Upper Copper-bear-

By R. P. Rothwell

About thirty miles north of the city of Belleville (which is situated on a branch of Lake Ontario), and in the township of Marmora, Ontario, there is found a belt of gold-bearing quartz veins, which present geological mineralogical, and economic features of great interest to the profession. The district in which these veins are found is characterized as a rolling country, with low rounded hills of syenitic granite, overlain on the flanks of the hills by Silurian limestones, which lie in nearly horizontal beds, and in some places are so fine in texture as to afford lithographic stone of a fair quality. The gold-bearing veins run north and south through this belt of syenitic granite, and are quartz-filled true fissures, with micaceous or talcoid slates forming the walfs of and horses in the veins. This

Jan 1, 1881

By Thomas M. Drown

Remarkable as have been the direct results of Danks's puddler, there are some indirect and incidental results, which are well worthy of study for their intrinsic value and suggestiveness. The success of Danks's machine is due mainly to the nature of the lining and the manner in which it is attached to the walls of the revolving chamber. Herein lies Danks's merit and good fortune. Given such a lining, and the success of the machine, as far as puddling iron is concerned, could easily be predicted. Other important results have, however, been obtained with this machine, which, though clearly explicable, were, nevertheless, unanticipated. These are the increased yield of bar-iron over the pig-iron charged, and the elimination of phosphorus, which, though not absolutely complete, is yet more decided than in the case of hand-puddling. As regards the increased yield, this is merely what we have a right to expect if we consider the puddling process to consist in the oxida tion of the carbon and silicon of the pig by the oxygen of the oxide of iron. That this result is attained, nearly to the extent that the theory requires, in Danks's puddler, and has never been more than partially attained by the most careful experiments in band-puddling, points clearly to the fact that the contact of the molten pig-iron with the oxide of iron is much more intimate and complete in the one instance than in the other. The action of puddling in Danks's machine may be considered to be twofold: first, the removal of the carbon, silicon, and phospho rus of the pig, which is the primary object, and, second, the produc tion of wrought iron direct from the ore, which is entirely an inci dental result. Intelligent metallurgists were not long in recognizing in this latter result a fact of deeper import and greater value than the attainment of a perfect puddling process. A new method

By Oswald J. Heinrich

At the Baltimore meeting of the Institute in February, 1879, Mr. Eckley B. Coxe, then president of the Institute, called attention in his address to the subject of Secondary Technical Education, and

Jan 1, 1881

By Charles M. Rolker

The Mariposa estate, a grant made by the Mexican Government to Juan 13. Alvarado, during the time when California was still under the dominion of Mexico, was purchased in 1847 by J. C. Fremont, and the United States patent issued to him in 1856. By sale, or its equivalent, money advanced, the property came into the hands of the Mariposa Company, June 25th, 1863, and through a varied existence of work and temporary inactivity, has as yet been kept as an undivided property, and rests at present with the Mariposa Land and Mining Company of California. I pass over this period of 15 years without giving the history of the ups and downs of the estate, partly because it is familiar to many, and also because I think in such a case this paper would assume too much the character of a narrative. The estate is situated in Mariposa County, California, about 170 miles southeast of San Francisco. It begins in lat. 37' 26' 38'' north, and long. 119' 55' west, and runs 6 miles north; thence 69 miles west; thence 5 miles northwesterly towards the Merced River; thence 84 miles southerly; thence 3 miles easterly; thence 1 mile southerly; thence 2 miles easterly; thence 2 miles southerly; thence 2 miles easterly; thence 1 mile southerly; thence 2 miles easterly; thence 1 mile northerly, and thence 2 miles easterly to the place of the beginning; embracing 44,387 acres (70 sq. miles) more or less. To describe this vast estate in detail as to its full geology, its numerous quartz veins, its many facilities to exploit them and work them by cheap methods, would lead me further than I intend to go at present, and I will content myself to describe the latest workings of the company and its immediate field of operations. As long ago as 1860 the late Dr. Adelberg advised the running of an adit from the northwestern edge of the estate at Benton Mills 011 the Mereed River. His object was to undercut the deepest workings of the then paying mines on the estate—the Pine Tree and Josephine. Following this advice, the tunnel known as "River Tunnel " was commenced. Its entrance is in S. 5, T. 4, s. R. 17 E. It is run in

Jan 1, 1879

By T. F. Witheree

The Fletcherville Furnace was built in 1864 and 1865, making its first blast from August until October of the latter year, when it was blown out to prevent its " bunging-up." Repairs were made in time to enable it to be blown in again December 12th, 1865, the blast ending October 7th, 1866. Total product 1921.15 tons iron, an average of 6.8.2.5 tons per day, from ores yielding 44.8 per cent. Consumption of charcoal 223.2 bushels per ton of iron. The furnace journal up to this time shows no record of furnace dimensions, or temperature of the blast, but as near as can be ascertained, they were as follows, viz.: Height of stack, 42 feet. Diameter of bosh, 11 feet. Angle of bosh, 71/2 inches to 12 inches rise, about 58°. Diameter of open tunnel head, 42 inches. Number of tuyeres 3 ; each 3 inches in diameter. Dam 15 inches high. Tuyeres 24 inches high. Tymp 224 inches high. Diameter of steam cylinder, 20) inches. } Diameter of blast cylinder, 64 inches. } Stroke 5 feet. The engine is direct-acting horizontal non-condensing. December 26th, 1866, the furnace was again put in blast, having been considerably altered in the crucible; the height of stack, bosh, and tunnel head remaining as before. Six tuyeres were put in, three in each of the side arches. The hearth or crucible was rectangular in form, 3 feet wide x 31/2 feet long x 64 feet high. Inclination of bosh 58°. Height of tuyeres 26 inches; nozzles 21/4 inches diameter. Temperature of blast estimated to be about 500°.

By G. H. Edmunds, C. H. Mathewson

About fifty pages of Henry M. Howe's profound treatise, "The Metallography of Steel and Cast Iron," are devoted to twinning with special reference to the origin, nature and general significance of the Neumann bands in ferrite. Howe believed with Osmond and Cartaud1 that the Neumanns are mechanical twins and his careful observations leave no doubt that these straight-sided narrow bands habitually occur parallel to trapezohedral planes of form {211). Attempts to develop the structure of the bands by various methods SO that their identity could be established beyond question have not been conspicuously successful. Howe thought that they deflected slip bands. Some of the etching figures which have been developed within and adjacent to Neumann bands support the contention that they are twins. A good example of this effect in ferrite containing 0.6 per cent, of niekel and 1.3 per cent. of phosphorus, originally due to Harnecker and Rassow,2 was reproduced in the 1928 lecture before the Institute of Metals Division on twinning in metals.3 In this case, the sides of the figures might represent the traces of cubic planes laid bare by etching a properly oriented grain of ferrite, twinned along a plane of form (211). Our own observations in this direction may be represented by Fig. 1 which shows in a deeply etched cavity in the boundary region between a Neumann band and the original crystal two small crystal surfaces which resemble the faces meeting at a reentrant angle in the simple cube twinned along a bisecting plane of form (211) as sketched in Fig. 2. Rosenhain and McMinn4 in 1925, after a careful study of slip bands in ferrite containing Neumanns previously produced by shock, concluded

By W. E. C. Eustis

In September last I had my attention called by Mr. R. G. Leckie to a deposit of nickel in the township of Orford, province of Quebec. In many ways it has proved to be a subject of great interest. As this ore is, as far as I can learn, entirely new in mineralogy and metallurgy, it has seemed to me that it would be a matter of interest to the Institute to have laid before it, in a short paper, the peculiarities I have met with in studying it. This deposit of nickel was first described by Dr. T. Sterry Hunt, our President, in the Geology of Canada, 1863, p. 738, in the follow ing terms: " The general diffusion of nickel throughout the magnesian rocks of the Quebec group has been already noticed. It has, however, never been met with in any considerable quantities in these rocks, although workable deposits of its ores may reasonably be looked for

Jan 1, 1879

By A. L. Holley

The first session was held in the rooms of the American Philosophical Society, on Tuesday evening, February 26th. The President, Dr. T. Sterry Hunt, called the meeting to order, and after a few introductory remarks concerning the importance of theoretical and speculative science, which often involves principles of the highest economic value, and, more than all that, serves to enlarge our conceptions of the universe, and ennoble us, by the cultivation which it affords to our most exalted faculties, proceeded to discuss some points in the chemistry of the atmosphere. It is known that there is in the crust of the earth a great amount of oxidized carbon, not only in the shape of coal, but also in the graphite or plunlbago of the crystalline rocks, in the various bituminous shales or pyroschists, which are found in all succeeding rock-formations, and also in the forms of bitumen and petroleum. All the analogies of nature lead us to conclude that these various carbonaceous substances have had an organic origin, and have been generated by the deoxidation of carbonic acid, a process effected by the growing plant, and attended with the liberation of oxygen. He showed that the carbon of a layer of coal covering the whole earth's surface to the thickness of one meter, would, in its production from carbonic dioxide, liberate an amount of oxygen equal to that now present in our atmosphere. But bituminous coal contains also a large amount of hydrogen, derived from the deoxidation of water, which implies the liberation of a farther portion of oxygen. The amount from this latter source would equal, for the various coals and asphalts, from one-eighth to one-fourth, and, for the petroleums, onehalf of that set free in the deoxidation of the carbon which these hydrocarbonaceous bodies contain. From what we know of the composition of the stratified rocks, it is probable that they include an amount of deoxidized carbon and hydrogen many times greater than that contained in a layer of coal one meter in thickness, and, consequently, that the disengaged oxygen in past ages must have far exceeded that now present in our atmosphere. To this must be added

Jan 1, 1879

By Henry Engelmann

ORes are generally found in the mines mixed with more or less base matter, which renders their treatment by smelting or milling unnecessarily costly. They have to be sorted. Those of a higher grade remain often mixed with substances which might, with hardly a loss of metal and at small expense, be removed by dressing machinery, and a concentrated and purified ore thus obtained, which would bring a far higher price, because it can be reduced by cheaper methods, and, at any rate, at less expense, besides affording a saving of transportation, which in our territories is often an item of no small magnitude. The ores of a lower grade have often to be

By Charles B. Dudley

DEAR SIR: It is now nearly three years since my first report to you on the subject of steel rails was written. That report, as you will remember, dealt principally with the question of the relation between the chemical composition and physical properties of steel rails end their power to resist crushing and fracture in actual service. Other matters were referred to or touched upon in that report, but the main question was, Why do some rails crush or break in service while others do not? Yon will doubtless remember that the principal conclusion arrived at was, that the softer rails are less liable to Crush or break in service than the hard ones. Or, in other words, so far as conclusions could be drawn from the chemical analysis and physical test of 25 samples of steel rails which had actually been in service, these conclusions were that those rails which have the smaller amounts of carbon, phosphorus, silicon, and manganese are less liable to crush or break in service than those which have larger amounts of these elements. Or, again, looked at in the light

Jan 1, 1881