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THE MARINE RECORD. 7 SES SEES PS AT RR AE SSS NOSED GDcctivunrenecmawermeneameesesmee rene et NO NEED FOR SPONSONS. _.War ships of this government will no longer be dis- figured by those ungainly excrescences on their sides known technically as sponsons, and hereafter will pre- sent the flush unobstructed sides of the merchant ves- sel. The necessity of wide arc of fire and room for the intricate mechanism of modern breech-loading rifles necessitated this superstructure projecting over the sides of all war ships, and not only were they expensive, but did not increase the efficiency of the battery or add to the appearance of the vessel. Naval Constructor Dashiell has worked out a scheme, through an ingeni- ous method of constructing the gun carriage, so that sponsons will not be required nor the ports necessarily be increased in size. This has been accomplished by reducing the frontage of the carriage and in making the whole piece square in front with a rounded rear, instead of circular as before. His plan has been sub- mitted to the leading experts of the department, ap- proved, and will be introduced hereafter on all new ships, the first to be the new battleships Kearsarge and Kentucky.’ Two of the small 1,000-ton gunboats build- ing north will also have the device applied, and the four new battleships will also be without sponsons. No other country has so far devised any means of doing away with the sponson, and this government, as in many other improvements in naval science, is the first This picture shows one of the additions made by F. W. Wheeler & Co., of West Ba has been rather unfortunate, having incurred some damage on her second trip down, thro acknowledge the courtesy of Seaboard for use of cut. to settle the perplexing question satisfactorily.—Army and Navy Register. rr « DOES NOT SHIPPING NEED PROTECTION? - Tothose of our readers who may be doubtful as to the need for some protection to American shipping in the struggle for commercial supremacy, and the advis- ability of the enactment of such a bill as is proposed by Senator Elkins, the following figures are submitted for _ inspection: Tonnage of American and foreign vessels entered into seaports of United States from 1868 to 1895: American. Foreign. Total. TRESS ee Seis CG cso ete 2,465,695 3,105,826 5,571,521 1 cig: OR hcp AROSE Ae 2,009,437. 8,521,090 11,530,527 JSS8;. Sashes els 2,913,998 10,042,161 12,956,159 ABOS cash Ws cules x5 0188: 5 3,676,651 13,048,696 16,725,347 The following table shows the tonnage of British and American ships respectively, entered at seaports of United States: British. American. bo Devel A] RAR Minin 5 Bie cole ep 2,348,201 2,465,695 Diora y Giiicesinel tie a TDs ke eel «> 5,232,573 3,009,437 ABSBa GE. | HOROLTG Le IG os Se sibs 6,673,122 2,913,998 1 EE AE 5 A sec SE AHIENP Eon RIAA 8,729,793 3,676,657 EE ee A new system of signaling has been adopted at the C. lL. & W. ore hoists at Lorain. The usual practice is to pull a string which raises a target at the top of the hoists, where it can be seen by the engineers. At present the boss carries a small switch-board, which has two wires leading to a bell in the engineer's room in the house. A touch of the button and a system of signals does the rest. It is much safer, as well as more con- venient, as the danger of accidents from mistakes in signals is minimized. TRADE AND INDUSTRIAL NOTES. The E. P. Allis Co., of Milwaukee, is engaged in fill- ing orders for $100,000 worth of engines for the mines at Johannesburg and elsewhere in South Africa. Wickes Bros., of Kast Saginaw, Mich., manufactur- ers of boilers, engines and heavy mill machinery, are building for Struthers, Wells & Co., of Warren, Pa,, a set of their new vertical plate bendiag rolls, 10’ 3’ be- tween housings, top roll 20’ diameter, and bottom rolls 16" diameter. They are also building a set of vertical rolls for John Mohr & Son, Chicago, which are 10’ 3"’ be- tween housings, top roll 22’’ diameter, and bottom rolls 17’’ diameter. 134"’ in thickness, and the tool will weigh complete 90,000 pounds. The H. Channon Co., of 24-26 Market street, Chicago, has issued its treatise on rope transmission, which will be sent upon application. Rope driving has come into BAR ne ee Wie aN ee THE STEAMSHIP L. C. WALDO. prominence as a factor in power transmission in recent years, and it will undoubtedly be read with interest by engineers and manufacturers everywhere. ‘To employ rope driving successfully proper conditions are required, and the correct principles of design and construction must be observed. ‘These points are explained with suitable tables and illustrations. The general cata- logue of the H. Channon Co. is ready, and they will be pleased to send copies to firms interested in the line. More than a dozen of the ‘‘Providence’’ yacht cap- stans in bronze and galvanized iron have been shipped to Great Britain within a short time for various yachts building there. One of these was placed in the yacht Samphire, designed and built by H. Sibbick, West Cowes, which yacht was the victor in the race in the Mediterranean recently, and others have been sold to Stow & Son, of Shoreham, and Pascall, Atkey & Son, of West Cowes. For more of these capstans were ordered by cable from Great Britain three weeks ago, anda very fine little vertical yacht windlass of bronze was shipped to Liverpool a short time siuce. The Ameri- can Ship Windlass Co. have been very successful in in- troducing their yacht machines in Great Britain, as they manufacture yacht windlasses and capstans which are very light, neat and attractive in design and hand- some in finish, These rolls are designed for plates upto: FLOTSAM AND JETSAM. The City of the Straits will be placed on the Cleve- land-Toiledo route about June 10. The House Committee on Commerce will report favor- ably on the bill establishing a life-saving station at Charlevoix, Mich. The Michigan Tug & Towing Co., has been made a party defendant in the libel of the Holland & Emery Lumber Co., vs. the tug Gladiator, for the loss of $8,687 worth of logs on Lake Huron in 1893. Capt. Joe Rouleau, of Sault Ste Marie, on Saturday night, May 16, piloted the steambarge Schoolcraft, with three schooners in tow, safely through the St. Mary’s river. This was the first time a tow has been taken through the river at night. When the steamer Byron Whitaker was off Whitefish Point in the gale of Sunday the 17th, her steering gear gave completely away off the rudder post. A small piece of wood was with difficulty placed in position as a tiller and was worked by tackle, and she got safely to Waiska Bay with her consorts. Capt. Daniel Wall, of the steambarge Francis Hinton, is one of the few masters on the few masters on the lakes that ascertains the deviation of his compass by the azimuth tables and corrects his chart courses for the magnetic variation, and this deviation, which he tabulates, to obtain compass courses, courses to be a ees seems noes y City, to the fleet of 1896, the steamer having been built to the order of the Roby Transportation Co. The Waldo ugh collision with the steamer Choctaw, at the Sault, the latter ship, however, having got the worst of it. We beg to steered by compass. He also frequently takes compass bearings of prominent points and from them plots the position of his boat on the chart.—Sturgeon Bay Advo- cate. = Ne ee STEEL VS. IRON. Such a scarein favor of iron ships as against steel has taken place in Great Britain that some owners’ superin- tendents on new steel vessels are now specifying a large portion of the work to be of iron, such as upper decks, tank tops, etc. A steel manufacturer has informed London Fairplay, however, that some time ago he made a number of experiments to test whether it really was the case that steel corroded more quickly than iron The experiments were carried out by means of plates of various thicknesses being exposed in both fresh and Salt water for periods from one month up to acouple of years, with the result that the steel plates exposed tora period up to six months corroded much faster than the iron ones, but after that the advantage lay with the steel, those exposed for two years being in a much better condition than the iron ones. Another thing learned was that ships built of steel within the last few years do not show the same inclination to corrode, from the fact that the manufacture of steel is better understood.