The following text may have been generated by Optical Character Recognition, with varying degrees of accuracy. Reader beware!

AIDS TO NAVIGATION. SURVEY OF SACKETT’S HARBOR. The last Congress made an appropriation of $5,000 for the improvement of Sackett’s Harbor, and Capt, King- man is now. considering as to the best method in which to apply this sum to the object. son, United States Engineer, has been making a survey of the historic place and a study of its local conditions, past and present, which would have an effect. upon the proposed works. Sackett’s Harbor has been the United States naval depot and navy yard for Lake Ontario from 1812 to the present time, and was for many years thé most important point on Lake Ontario. Much val- uable information as to the past conditions will be shown upon the map and chart which Capt. Kingman intends to have published by the United States Engineer Department. Sackett is now, at the present extremely low stage of lake, a nine-foot harbor, but the material which makes it so shallow is soft mud which could be.re- moved at a low cost. COMMANDER DAYTON’S RECOMMENDATIONS. The annual report of Commander J. H. Dayton, U.S. N., inspector of the ninth light-house district, says win- ter navigation appears to be on the in- crease, and recommends that ‘“‘in erecting future stations it would bewell to provide for the extreme cold weather then en- countered. This applies especially,’ he says, “‘ to fog signals and to dwellings for keepers. During the coming year six new steam fog signals will be established on - Lake Michigan, rendering the question of fuel supply, already a difficult one, very serious.’? Commander Dayton, in view of this, recommends the establishment near Cheboygan of a fuel station, and adds that the light-house tender Warrington should be fitted up as a fuel boat to sup- ply all stations on the east and west coasts of Lake Michigan. He recommends the establishment of a light and fog signal on Little Gull Island, and a light on St. Martin’s Island. The chain of lights on the west coast, he says, would be complete if a coast light were erected at Point aux Barques, which is half way between Seul Choixand Poverty Island. There is forty-six miles of coast line between these points, at present un- protected, though at the last session Con- gress provided for a light at Sturgeon William Pierson Jud-. THE MARINE RECORD... and, of course, can be classifiedas a saving. As the Hay Lake Channel now stands it has cost ithe govern- ment $2,165,000. The original estimate of the cost was $2,650,000, but owing to the-improved methods of work and other causes the cost)was greatly lessened. Just as soon as the new range lights aresplaced a vastly larger number of boats will run the channel at night than was the case with the old channel, COMMANDER MEAD’S REPORT. The annual report of Commander W. W. Mead, in- spector of light-houses for the eleventh district, makes a number of recommendations, which include the enlarge- ment of the keeper’s residence at Windmill Point, at the head of the Detroit river,and the repairing of the piling of the cluster at Grosse Pointe. Commander .Mead says the light-ship off Grosse, Point is becoming unser- viceable, and that since the adoption of mineral. oil lanterris at the Fort Gratiot range lights instead, of electric lights, no complaints have been heard. His recommendations are accompanied. bythe estimated cost of the improvements suggested. DEFENSE OF SANDUSKY HARBOR. The Sandusky Register explains the bottom damage recently received by the Thos. Maytham at that port as i Bay canal, within this area, which has not yet been erected. The following rec- ommendations arealso made: The re- moval of the fog bell at Tail Point, Green Bay; a lighted beacon in Green Bay harbor to make it accessible at night ; a light-vessel at Peshtigo shoal, Green Bay, to cost $15,000, in place of the light authorized by Congress at its last session to cost $10,000; (he says he doubts if $10,000 would be sufficient to build this light, and that anyway a light-vessel would much better serve the purpose) ; a fog signal or bell at Little Traverse; a fog signal or bell on Grand Traverse; a steam fog signal at Michigan City. Commander Dayton says it will soon be necessary to establish harbor lights on piers at Michigan City. Tem- porary lights are already maintained there. He says ’ the numerous lights kept by fishermen on the north pier in Chicago harbor are very confusing to navigators entering the harbor, and legislation should be asked to prevent the exhibition of unauthorized lights on the piers in the near vicinity of aids to navigation. HAY LAKE CHANNEL. From General Superintendent . S. Wheeler’s annual report, it is ascertained that during the year/the entire commerce passing St. Mary’s Falls canal used the Hay Lake Channel, with the exception of a few boats and rafts. ‘The total freight carried was 13,636,270 tons, and the cost of transportation, as determined for the year 1894 was .99 mills per mile ton. The distance saved by the Hay Lake Channel is 11 miles, and the total cost of carrying the volume of freight above stated that distance would be $148,499. This is about 7 per cent. of the cost of the new channel, Seen ———————— NEW SYSTEM OF PLATING. (ILLUSTRATED. ) Asystemof plating ships which has been patented is. now being adopted by W. Doxford & Sons, of Sun- derland, Eng., builders of the Progressist and other turret steamers. ) The system in question is the dis- pensing with packing or lining pieces throughout, and at the same time securing, it is claimed, an equally neat, tight and strong job. Packing, while not con- tributing to strength, is an addition to weight, the ab- sence of which is much better than its presence, if the structural items proper can be manipulated so as to bear closely ‘‘metal to metal.”’ At present, the shell and deck plating, with strakes worked on the usual raised and sunk, or ‘‘in-and-out”’ principle, have packing or filling slips fitted on every frame or beam, behind the outside or raised strakes. The new system dispenses with all such fillings by jog- gling the edges of each outside strake over the edges of the adjoining inner strakes; every strake thereby being brought right home to the frames or beams with- out liners. For the joggling Messrs. Doxford have had made a special machine tool. The edges of the plates forming the outside strakes are run between rollers, which rollers are so shaped and, adjusted relatively to each other as to form the joggle or indent required as the plaie passes through. The system has. been applied par- tially to one of the vessels recently built by Doxford & Sons, and to an- other vessel just launched the system has been applied throughout. No dif- ficulty has been found in carrying the joggling to the ends, where owing to the curye and twist of the strakes, difficulty might have been anticipated. This even applies to outer plates, or those under the counter, and plates above and below the propeller boss, as no difficulty is experienced in pass- ing plates of any set through the joggling rolls. The vessel just finished is 2,700 tons register, the total weight of the metal worked into her structure being about ’ 1,300 tons. As compared with a similar vesselin which the joggling system had no place, there has been a saving in weight of hull of about 38 tons, or a netgainin material saved of 2 per cent. Three-fourths of this total is made up of the weight of packing and liners dispensed with, and close on MACHINE FOR ““JOGGLING” PLATES. (Courtesy Engineer, New York.) ‘ follows: ‘‘The accident occurred in the channel, a short distance from the Short Line docks. It was sim- ply the result of carelessness on the part of the dredge men at work on the harbor front channel. While they were at work they came across a large boulder which was too big for their dipper, and the boulder rolled into the middle of the channel. It was allowed to remain there for several hours, and vesselmen were not in- formed of the obstruction in the channel, and when the Maytham was being towed out. by the tug Peerless she struck it. She was released a few hours afterwards and went up with her cargo of coal. There is low water at all ports and Sandusky’s harbor is undoubt- edly one of the best along the chain of lakes.”’ rm 0 ee 6 ie TOO FREQUENT. The recent bursting of a hot water pipe on the torpedo boat Ericsson, in which five of the crew were terribly scalded, once again calls public attention to what is too frequently happening on steam vessels. In Kuropean navies such disasters have a record of ominous fre- quency, and the Hricsson affair is not without its warn- ing to American marine. Heavier pressure and in- creased speeds are in fashion, and the risks incurred have their price. It is known that on torpedo boats the heatendured by the engineers, etc., is next to being cooked alive. ‘This is inseparable from the speed main- tained, but it seems that something remains to be done in securing the steam and hot water pipes in the engine and boiler rooms of steamships.—Railway Review. one-fourth of it by the weight of ce- ment saved, owing to the outer strake of plating on the bottom being brought up close to the frames. As regards labor, the gain is alsoclear and cousiderable. The work of riveting through two-ply of material is obvious- ly less difficult and exhausting than through three-ply, as is the case when packing is present. The work of fit- ting,tapering, templeting ang and liners isin itself no small item, and dispensing with it means, in the case of large vessels, a saving of some consequence. To be deducted from the total saving in labor and material is the cost of joggling the plates by the special machine, which, how- ever, is only about 10 per cent of the total. The gain in car- rying capability is not quite equivalent to the 38 tons of material saved, because from this figure must be deducted some 10 tons of loss in dis- placement due to the finer form of the hull caused by the inward indent given to the outer or raised strakes of -plating by this system. The perpetual gain, how- ‘ever, of some 28 tons carrying power secured by this system ina vessel 2,700 tons register over a vessel of ‘the same size built on the ordinary principle, is a consid- eration which shipowners will be glad to note and ap- preciate. punching the packing pieces PR eer ANS eer apes Rie aes AS Fg os a SE igh Dh athe Cth ee ic Ie RDP AR MRE a POEM tate yee? ee oo i