SECOND DAY-AFTERNOON SESSION.

The Association reconvened at 2 o'clock, P. M., President Copley occupying the Chair. At the suggestion of the President, the proceedings were opened by finishing the contents of the

QUESTION BOX.

6. "What methods can be recommended for the better using or disposing of tar?"

THE PRESIDENT-Has anyone an idea on this subject?

MR. MCMILLAN-A good way would be to burn it up. I understand that only about 11⁄2 cents to 2 cents per gallon is offered for tar, and so I think the better plan would be to use it as fuel.

MR. KELLOGG I read a statement not long ago which showed that tar had a value of 5 cents per gallon when used in the generator on the down run. I am not prepared to give the details, but it was claimed that it was worth more in that way than in any other.

THE PRESIDENT-Can Mr. Butterworth answer the question? MR. BUTTERWORTH-At Columbus we have been distilling our tar for the last five years, and to very good advantage. We have in the past week disposed of our tar for the next five years. I do not know at present of any better way of permanently procuring better results, or of developing more revenue from tar, than by distilling it.

MR. ODIORNE-This suggestion may be of some avail. In the putting down of brick pavements, see that the parties interested. have the specifications include coal tar joints. This is a great advantage. It is so used in Chicago largely, and those in many other places might in this way provide profitable means for using some of the tar.

MR. ATWATER-If my recollection is accurate, for the last ten years tar has been worth only 3 or 4 cents per gallon. If I am wrong in that statement, I would like to be corrected.

MR. ODIORNE-Nearer three than four.

MR. ATWATER-Nearer three than four at the point of production, but perhaps nearer four than three at the point of consumption. I think I am also right in saying that the price has now fallen at the point of production to nearer two cents than three. Therefore it becomes a material question whether other methods can be devised whereby the demand for and value of tar can be increased. Ultimately tar can be burned, and it has a fuel value of

perhaps 11⁄2 times its weight of coal. That is, if coal is worth $2 per ton tar is worth about $3 per ton to burn. That is, certainly a low valuation, although there is a slight saving in freight which might be considered. If it is possible to get any further utility out of that product than simply its fuel value, I think we are all interested in knowing it. I am specially interested in it, and wish to do anything I can to ameliorate the present condition. In Europe the practice has been to turn the tar into the form of briquettes, and to-day the tar and pitch have a greater value there than they have in this country. Perhaps I may be wrong in that statement, but the last quotation I saw was 25 shillings per ton in London, or $6 per ton, which I think is better than 22 cents per gallon. Pitch is worth about $6 or $7 per ton there, which perhaps is not so very far different from the price here. As a great deal of pitch has been exported from England to this country, it would seem as if the price here ought to be as good as the price there. The foreign pitch has been largely absorbed in the making of briquettes—a form of fuel of which we know very little about here. I have used them abroad, and find them to be a very useful fuel. The conditions in this country, with cheaper coal and longer haulage for the briquettes, would affect the demand for the latter, and I do not know whether those conditions can be overcome; but it does seem to me that, either in the form of briquettes or in some other form, it should be possible to get a higher value for tar than we are obtaining at the present time.

THE PRESIDENT-Can Mr. Steinwedell tell us what they are doing with coal tar in Germany?

MR. STEINWEDELL-The principal use of it there, so far as I am informed, is to distill it. This is especially so in the case of Russia, where they have at Warsaw a very large tar distilling plant. Of course, in a plant of that kind, it is requisite to have the most efficient apparatus, and also experienced men to handle it. The aim in such works is by working up the tar to reap all the profit instead of having to go through other hands. It is a very common practice there to heat parlors with briquettes, which are made from coal dust ground up and cemented together with pitch and tar which had been boiled down. I have never seen it used for heating benches.

THE PRESIDENT-The next question is:

7. "In view of the unprecedented leakage of last winter, what ratio of generating capacity to maximum daily output can be considered safe in small coal gas works?"

MR. BREDEL-A two-hundredth of the yearly output. There are some places where it might be even the year round. As the "unforeseen leakage" of last winter depended upon unknown conditions, this is rather a difficult question to answer.

THE PRESIDENT-It seems to me Mr. Bredel has answered that it will depend entirely upon what the age of your horse is. The next query is

8. "Does it pay gas companies to pipe houses?"

MR. ODIORNE-I can give some experience in piping houses. About three years ago we had many small houses along our lines of mains which had no pipes and no connections with street mains, and found that the people along those streets had been discouraged about putting in pipes by the fact that the cost was so great. Going to a plumber or gasfitter to make inquiries, he would measure for the work, and his estimate of the cost would be so great that it was practically prohibitory. We sent a canvasser along the lines of our mains, who took with him samples of gas fixtures, brackets, etc. He told the occupants of a house just what it would cost to pipe the place, set the fixtures and brackets at the necessary points, run the services, and set the meter. Then he added they could pay $2 down, and thereafter pay $1 per month on account of the bill. In that way we got a great many customers, and found that after they had used gas in the house, and had the fixtures and piping paid for (the next year probably), they would want a gas stove. We further found that class of customers about the best we had, in that they grumbled less, appreciated the worth of the gas stoves, and paid their bills promptly and cheerfully. I think we got over 300 new customers in our town the first year after taking up this piping business. We arranged to do that piping very cheaply. We rigged up a wagon with the necessary pipe vise, box of tools and fittings. The man with his helper went right to the house, took the measurements, went out to his wagon and got the pipe and put it in. He had no excuse for running back to the shop for tools that he had forgotten, or found that he had a pipe that had split, or one that had a sand hole in it, or anything of that kind, to make delays in the work. He did the work very quickly and cheaply, and it proved to be one of the best paying investments we have made.

MR. MITCHELL-What did Mr. Odiorne figure the cost per drop at the house?

MR. ODIORNE-In old houses we figured it at $1 per drop-if everything is tight, $1 per drop will pay for them. If he finds a leak that is so difficult to locate that it takes extra time to go over

the piping, we charge an additional $i. In new houses we charge $1 for every opening, and if there were a number of openings we charged a trifle less than that.

THE PRESIDENT-The next question is

9. "Should 60° F. be taken as standard for correction in computing our records for comparison with our distribution records of gas sent out? In other words, would it not be more nearly right to base our correction on atmospheric temperature for making a record on which to judge our leakage, and the accuracy of

our meters?"

MR. J. R. LYNN-Replying to the query, I would reiterate the statement made in a previous discussion upon the same subject, that corrections for atmospheric conditions would not lessen the complication. In fact, such a plan would only tend to complicate matters to a greater extent, owing to the impossibility of ascertaining the average temperature at the final points of registration -at the consumers' meters. If a correction be made at the station meter, with the purpose of arriving at exact loss, the necessity of further and more complicated corrections naturally follows. It is reasonable to suppose that when we obtain the highest average at our works we shall also find the maximum at the point of consumption, and vice versa. A correction to a standard in the summer, therefore, increases indicated leakage, while in the colder season one has a contra effect. It does not follow that averages would be the same, or that variations between the points considered would always be through the same range. Viewing the matter in such a light, one is compelled to say decidedly that it is best. to consider all meter statements exactly as we find them, independent of atmospheric variations. With properly condensed gas there is no more occasion for alteration in indicated registration of production than there would be for several hundreds or thousands in sales to consumers. There is no more reason why 60° should be considered a standard than that one should substitute as such the mean average temperature and barometric pressure of the locality in which his product is sold. Upon this latter it might be even more proper to base adjustment of meters, but that plan would also possess serious disadvantages, due to various locations of consumers' meters, under houses, in exposed areas, or almost in direct contact with furnaces or boilers; also, the temperature of soil through which mains and services pass, and the rate of consumption governing the length of time our product is in contact with affective conditions. When one makes corrections under such variety of disadvantages, he is obviously drawn from

safe, shallow water into deep, dangerous current. Temperature is not the most prominent cause of leakage, as expressed by percentage. A large consumption per mile of main, with constant and careful repairs to the distributing system, not only reduces percentage of loss, but also, what is more desirable still, increases earnings. Corrections at works profit nothing.

MR. GIMPER-What would the gentleman do in my case? Our station meter is in a little building in the yard, where it is exposed to the rays of the sun from sunrise until sunset. The gas being measured at a very high temperature, therefore, shows a very high yield, but I do not believe we sell our gas at half that temperature. All other meters are better protected than our station meter. I take the temperature of the gas eight times per day, and reduce it to an average, and at the end of the month make the necessary correction.

MR. ATWATER-Do you take the meter temperature at the same time?

MR. GIMPER-Yes.

A MEMBER-I would not set the station meter where it would be so exposed.

MR. GIMPER-There is a frame building over it.

A MEMBER-I would not care to have a frame building about the gas works where such building could be avoided.

MR. BREDEL-I think each engineer should suit himself about making comparisons, yet, as we are accustomed to taking 60° as the standard, and as all our calculations are made for that_temperature, I think we should keep to that standard. As to what a man does about his own works he can suit himself, but if he wants to make a statement to others as to what he is doing, then he should take 60° as the standard of comparison.

MR. JENKINS-As a rule the principal object among gas engineers in fixing a standard of temperature is to find out something about their leakage. In other words, it is not to determine the heat, but to ascertain the amount of unaccounted-for gas. Mr. Gimper, in getting his gas down to 60°, puts himself in an excellent position to have a very small quantity of unaccounted-for gas. I think that in Galveston, or in any territory of the far south, he should correct it to about 70° temperature, and he would get nearer his sales. I believe he averages a temperature of over 60° on sales. If he is making it at 60° and selling at 65° or 70°, there would be times when he would sell more gas than he would make. I have thought the matter over during the past few days since I first saw this question, and I believe that in the United States there ought to be three different standards of temperature