seven instead of forty pounds, and that was the only order he gave to the engineer. The next morning he asked me to go up with her again and see how she would go. I did so; and she made a good run, first-rate, kept the steam up, and had no trouble. Then Mr. Van Santvoord was pleased with her. After making the second or third trip, he told the captain to take up the two landings again, Cornwall and Milton, and she then made all the regular landings, and made regular and better time and burned less fuel. It was just because they attended to business. All the orders the engineer gave to the fireman in the morning was, "The boss has told us to carry thirty-seven pounds of steam; now, you attend to your business and do that, and for me to run with a wide throttle." For the ordinary side-wheel steamboats the Stevens cut-off has been the best thing we have ever put on. In many cases the engines are sometimes a little scant in power, and then they cannot turn good, steady wheels without cutting off in the neighborhood of half stroke. I could tell you some things that the Mary Powell and other boats did, but I think I had better not take up any more of your time.

Mr. James G. Winship.-I would like to add, in connection with Mr. Fletcher's remarks, some experience of my own in regard to cut-offs, and to relate a story: It was my fortune to be the engineer of a steamer with a beam engine with a Sickles cut-off. The engine was built in New York, and put in a boat on Lake Erie, called the City of Buffalo. The engine was fitted with Stevens cut-off. It was taken out of that boat and brought to New York and put in an ocean-going steamer, called the Morro Castle, and a Sickles cut-off was substituted for the Stevens cutoff. The same engine is now in the steamboat Grand Republic, running in this harbor, and is now fitted with Stevens cut-off. The boilers on the Morro Castle were small, and the engine had a jet condenser. We fed salt water in the boilers, which necessitated a constant feed and blow-off, so that when we would clean fires we had to cut off very short to maintain a steady pressure of steam. The captain came in the engine room once and said he wanted to know how it was that we could always have twentyfive pounds of steam, when the ship would sometimes go like the devil, and at other times she would just crawl, and all the time you have twenty-five pounds of steam. I started to explain to him that it was on account of the adjustable cut-off, when he said, "Damn the cut-off," and left me.

Talking about poppet valves, a great deal of loss is due to the difference in expansion between the chest and valves. In that old engine we never could tell about the condition of the valves, unless we took the hand-hole plate off the steam chests, and tested the valves while the chest was hot. The valves and seats were then made of brass-I believe Mr. Fletcher now makes both seats and valves of cast-iron. Then, another thing, both with the Sickles cut-off and with the Stevens it is easy to lose steam. If you have a Sickles cut-off and want to have the valve seat without noise, ten to one the valve does not seat, but fetches up on the water in the dash-pots, and with the Stevens cut-off the valve may be held off the seat by the toes. I was taught when a boy to see that the valve stem was loose in the lifter when the valve was seated.

The old Stevens cut-off is a good thing. When we used to go down the bay, a friend of mine on another ship would go down with us, but he could beat us. I asked, "Donegan, how far can you follow?" He said, "Eleven feet." His engine was eleven feet stroke. "How far do you generally follow?" "Oh, about three feet," he would say. He had gags fitted to his cut-off.

DCCLXX.*

ELECTRICITY IN COTTON MILLS.

BY W. B. SMITH-WHALEY, COLUMBIA, S. C.

(Member of the Society.)

ELECTRICITY as a means of transmitting power has been considerably dealt with in several very able papers before this Society; and it is not my purpose to take up valuable time in covering again ground which has been only too well and ably investigated, desiring to give only the results of my experience with electricity as a means of transmitting power in a cotton mill. Its many useful dispositions have been described fully, but in every case we lack direct comparison from actual practice, which would picture it to us in its true commercial light. It is the purpose of this paper to attempt to describe from the actual operation of two plants working under as nearly identical conditions as two manufacturing institutions can-the one operated by rope transmission with heavy head shafts, sheaves, etc., and the other by means of motors distributed throughout the building. In one the actual operation of the steam engine is considered; in the other the current is supplied to the motors from the secondary switchboard or receiving station.

Many have considered electric transmission in the light of a source of power, and we often hear comparisons on it with regard to power costs which are very misleading. Some have been imprudent enough to assert its economy for power purposes in connection with uneconomical water-power plants, as the means of making such developments commercially available; and several large plants for cotton mills have been developed on this line with such blindness as to their true commercial value from an economical standpoint that room is left for well-founded scepticism of their true value when compared with the many other more economical installations which might have been effected. Electricity's true position, for power purposes, is that

* Presented at the New York meeting (December, 1897) of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, and forming part of Volume XIX. of the Transactions.

of a transmitter; and whatever the source of power, the point to be considered is its efficiency in connection with that source for transmitting purposes. Having settled that, our investigation then leads to its comparison with other well-known methods of transmission.

For the purposes of this paper we will take up the investigation, by tabulated data, from the actual every-day operation of the plants. The period during which the conditions as regards the working load were approximately the same was between the 1st of April and the 25th of June, 1897, and we shall designate the two plants as No. 1 and No. 2. No. 1 is a steam-driven mill, having a steam plant geared up with ropes, heavy head gearing, and large tapering shafts as such plants are usually geared up in the best practice of to-day. The steam engine is an 800 horse-power Corliss cross compound, built in 1895, with cylinders 20 and 40 by 60 inches stroke, and a rope wheel 24 feet pitch diameter, grooved for 26 1-inch ropes, weighing 35 tons. This engine is being operated at an exceptionally low cost per horse-power for steam. There were in the mill during the period for which comparison of power is made 11,776 spindles and 720 looms; all the spindles and preparatory machinery were run full, but the looms did not average more than 682 per day. No. 2 is an electric-driven mill which rents its current from a central station and distributes it through a continuous-reading wattmeter to four 150 horse-power inverted motors bolted to the ceiling in convenient locations for economical distribution of the power, and belted to the shafting. The mill has been in operation since the 1st of January, 1897. This mill had in operation during the period named above, on an average, 12,448 spindles, with preparatory machinery, and an average of 356 looms out of 500 in the mill. The weight of the shafting in the steam mill is approximately 136,000 pounds, and in the electric mill 122,000 pounds.

POWER IN EACH MILL.

From the diagram (Fig. 114) showing the power curves in the two mills during the period alluded to, we find that the average in the steam mill is 535.71 horse-power for all purposes (this mill is only partly filled with machinery, and is using not quite twothirds of its full power). From indicator cards taken, we find that the power required to drive the shafting and belting on