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By Hugh Archbald

IT is possible to construct a simple diagram of the earnings, or the production, of the men employed at a coal mine that will show not only if the conditions tend toward contentment among the men, but if the operating distribution of the work is correct. As earnings are the greatest cause of discontent, even exceeding all the other causes, if contentment exists in the matter of earnings, the likelihood of other discontents flaring up is greatly lessened. The basis of such a diagram would be the Gaussian curve of the normal variation in human ability. Such a curve has long been recog-nized. H. L. Moore,1 in discussing the quantitative relation between wages and ability says: "It has been pointed out that industrial efficiency is dependent upon physical, mental, and moral qualities, and these qualities . . . there is good reason for regarding as being distributed according to the Gaussian law..

Jan 7, 1924

AN economist at MIT provided Americans with myth destroying information which should prove effective against the gentlemen of the extreme left. For a number of years they have charged that a small number of companies in each industry has been grabbing more and more of the industry's business. M. A. Adelman has shown that the concentration of business in the hands of big corporations has not shown any sign of growth during the last 50 years. Quite the contrary, there has been a slight decline in this concentration, according to Adelman. There are more small companies per thousand population than ever before. Bearing this out is the fact that International Harvester is now doing 41 pct of the possible market against a former 85 pct; American Can Co. has dropped from 90 pct to 50 pct; American Smelting is down to 31 pct compared with 90 pct; and lastly, U. S. Steel which has plummeted from 65 pct to slightly more than 30 pct of the steel market. Declines of the same proportions have hit big companies in other industries. Price cuts on Detroit's 1953 automobiles indicate that even among the biggest competition is still one of the most important household gods. Big business is still slugging it out for the attention of the American consumer. It's a battle which can only have one result-benefit to the man who buys.

Jan 1, 1953

By A. A. Terchick, J. C. Anderson, D. T. King

During 1972-1973, U.S. Steel acquired an existing southern West Virginia high volatile coal mine property including a 150 tph heavy media feldspar jig preparation plant. Expansion of production from the property required an increase in plant capacity to 300 tph, replacement of the feldspar jig with a hydrocyclone circuit, and inclusion of a water clarification thickener system. The rugged and restrictive nature of the terrain adjacent to the plant facility indicated prohibitive construction costs and severe site congestion would be encountered if a conventional water clarification thickener were installed. A high-loading, small-volume thickener, developed initially for the sugar beet industry by the Enviro-Clear Co. of New York, was investigated by U.S. Steel Research for possible coal preparation application, utilizing bench scale and small scale pilot plant evaluation methods. Results of testing at existing U.S. Steel preparation plants indicated predictable successful application of the Enviro-Clear thickener, so a 35-ft-diam unit was installed. The two-phase thickener system, utilizing presettled bottom sludge as a filter-clarification media, has successfully performed since commissioning in April 1973, producing clarified water competitive with conventional thickener systems with freedom from usual thickener operational problems.

Jan 1, 1976

By S. A. Braley

DRAINAGE of acid mine water into surface streams of coal mining areas is one of the most serious problems of stream pollution, since there is no known method that completely prevents its forming and no economically feasible treatment after it has formed. The mine acid problem differs from other pollution hazards because acid production does not end with cessation of mining but actually becomes more evident when pumping is stopped. The acid problem in the Pennsylvania, Ohio, West Virginia, and Kentucky bituminous coal areas of the U. S. began with the first operation in 1761, and the volume of acid discharge today is largely the cumulative result of years of mining. Provided they lie above the drainage area, the oldest mines, now long abandoned, are almost without exception producing acid in the same manner as those now operating or recently abandoned. It is well to consider some of the many procedures that have been used to determine the composition

Jan 1, 1957

By Charles W. Oxford, R. L. Huntington

During the past 20 years (1932-1952), many condensate reservoirs have been discovered in the United States, particularly in the Gulf Coast region. Most of these reservoirs have been produced by a combination of gas cycling and slow pressure depletion in order to recover the liquefiable components from the single-phase fluids originally existing within the Although a record of the composition of the produced fluids has been kept on some of these reservoirs, very little laboratory work has been done on small scale replicas so as to obtain some idea of the effect of such variables as fluid flow withdrawal and cycling rates, pressure, temperature, percentage of liquid hydrocarbon and water saturation within the reservoir. Weinaug and Cordell have shown experimentally that condensates can be revaporized within a sand reservoir; however, they studied only the effect of fluid withdrawal rate. In this investigation the above mentioned variables were studied experimentally in small scale reservoirs both in the case of vaporization of condensate by batchwise pressure deple-

Jan 1, 1953

By D. L. Albright, R. W. Kraft, J. A. Ford

HE unidirectional solidification of A1-CuAl, eutec-tic specimens to produce an essentially parallel lamellar structure has been described previously.' Ingots solidified in this manner ordinarily exhibit three macroscopic zones. In Zone I, at the head end of the ingot, a large number of slightly elongated grains occur in which the lamellae are highly distorted and twisted. After a few centimeters of growth, this distribution gradually changes to a small number of coarse grains elongated in the growth direction and in which the lamellae are quite regular, Zone 11. Zone 111, at the tail end of the ingot,

Jan 1, 1963

By John D. Ridge, Robert C. Barwick

The quantities and destinations of the metallic ores and concentrates and partially or fully refined metals in international trade result from the interaction of many factors, of which geographic location is only one. How far the processes of concentration and refining are to be carried in the country in which the mining is done and what dictates the destinations to which the more or less completely processed raw materials will move are determined not only by present-day geologic, political, and economic conditions, but also by the patterns set up by these same conditions as they obtained in the past. The first generalization that can be made regarding trade in metal raw materials-one that affects the form in which the material is transported, rather than the patterns followed by that trade-is that concentration is carried out for all low grade ores, nonferrous or ferrous, in the country in which they originate. (Rule 1.) Economic considerations alone almost always require that this be done; only high grade iron, manganese, and chromite ores can be shipped as they are mined.

Jul 1, 1955

By R. H. King

The Automatic Extraction System (AES) was designed and built under a US Department of Energy Contract by the National Mine Service Co. in cooperation with the Lee Engineering Division of Consolidation Coal Co. The Pennsylvania State University, Mining Engineering Section, was contracted as an independent auditor of the AES performance. The AES had a rotating cutter drum like a continuous mining machine. But two hydraulically powered roof supports, four roof-bolting drills, a dust scrubber, a ventilation fan and ducting in the roof supports, semi-automatic control, an extensible chain conveyor, and other innovations led to the distinction "extraction system" as opposed to "miner-bolter" or continuous mining" machine. After design and assembly, the AES was field tested experimentally in an underground coal mine. The in-mine performance audit was preceded by a computer simulation of the potential production for a later comparison with the actual tonnage mined by the AES. This paper describes the results of an in-mine trial and assesses the production potential of the AES.

Jan 1, 1983

B. S. and E. M. from the School of Mines at Socorro, New Mexico, in May, 1912. Immediately after graduating, he began as a practical miner in the U. S. mines at Bingham, Utah, but in November, 1912, he entered the operating department of the Chino Copper Co.'s concentrator at Hurley, New Mexico, where he stayed until July, 1913. During the latter half of 1913, he was employed as chemist in the laboratory of the El Paso smelter, at El Paso, Texas. In December, 1913, he became engineer and geologist with the Empire Zinc Co., at Socorro, New Mexico, which position he held at the time of his admission to the Institute in 1914, and until he entered the army in June, 1918. Before beginning the study of mining, Mr. Ringlund had completed a course in pharmacy, which accounts for his enlisting in the Medical Corps. Lieutenant George Roper, Jr. George Roper, Jr., a Junior Member of the Institute, was killed in an aeroplane accident near Shotwich, England, on Play 25, 1918. He was born at Steubenville, Ohio, in 1893, and at the time of his admi~sion to the Institute in 1916 was a student in mining and metallurgy at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Boston, Mass., from which he received the degree of S. B. in June, 1917. In August, 1917, he enlisted in the Royal Flying Corps, and after preliminary training on this side of the water, was sent to England. He was making the final cross-country flight of his course of training when the accident occurred.

Jan 1, 1920

WHOEVER has occasion to judge tin in its whiteness from the testimony of his eyes alone would surely believe it to be purest silver, or something that comes very near to it in nature. This is even more so when, on handling, it is found to be harder than lead, to which it can be said to have a greater and closer resemblance. But whoever has actual experience with tin knows that none of the other metals is less similar to it than silver. For silver mixes with every metal, as does gold; and they unite together, and the others do likewise; and except for their color they change their natures but little. But this metal tin, wherever it is found, acts like a powerful poison which envenoms and corrupts the others; and it does this not only with large quantities but also with every small amount; indeed just the trace remaining where it has been melted is enough to embrittle silver and gold as well as iron and copper. The greater the quantity of it in these, the greater are its effects. Speculators of natural causes say that this fact arises from its great wateriness, which is very subtle and poorly decocted and almost like that of quicksilver. This wateriness, then, by means of its subtlety which joins itself with metals, imposes itself into that unctuous and viscous material which renders them flexible, and thus deprives them of their toughness

Jan 1, 1942

By John W. Straton

The President of the United States signed Public Law 91-173 on December 30, 1969 and the Federal Coal Mine Health and Safety Act of 1969 became law. The Bureau of Mines was required to promulgate regulations to implement the law. Unfortunately, some stipulations of the Act were not technologically possible. The USBM employed many new inspectors and had to instruct both old and new personnel in the requirements of the law. Mine operators and mine workers also had to be informed. There was a fair measure of inconsistency during this period. Progress is being made, however, and it is becoming easier for mining personnel to know what needs to be done. There are some unresolved questions, however, and there still appears to be an appreciable lack of uniformity in the application of the law by the many federal inspectors.

Jan 10, 1972

By J. M. Lohr

A COMMERCIAL development requiring a suitable alloy or alloys for sealing into various grades of glass made it desirable to have a more exact knowledge of the expansion characteristics of the nickel-iron alloys than appeared in the published literature. The expansion of the more common. FIG. I.-EXPANSION CURVES OF SEVERAL FIG. 2.-EXPANSION CURVES OF TWO TYPES OF GLASS. (Courtesy of R. C. A.) TYPES OF GLASS. (Courtesy of R. C. A.) types of glass under consideration varies from 2.7 to 10.4 X 10-6 per degree Centigrade, over the range 20° to 400° C. For reference, the thermal expansion curves f several types of glass used for sealing by the lamp and tube industries are given (Figs. 1 and 2). This paper covers a detailed investigation of the thermal expansion of a series of nickel-iron alloys in which the nickel content varies from 30 to 70 per cent. Particular stress is laid on the alloys that contain between 40 and 55 per cent Ni.

Jan 1, 1938

By B. Etkin, A. A. Haasz

The Infrasizer Mk III, developed at the University of Toronto, is capable of sizing particles of a few pm to hundreds of pm according to particle terminal velocity, which is a function of particle density, size and shape. The factors limiting the performance of the Infrasizer Mk III have been presented and analyzed. It has been established theoretically and experimentally that the device has excellent potential as a laboratory instrument. The principle is applicable to a continuous production classifier, a prototype of which is now under development.

Jan 1, 1980

By W. R. Crandall

The southern gold-fields offer some of the most complex and trying problems encountered in mining; and their successful solution often means the success or failure of the particular enterprise involved. In vein-mining, where the values are scattered over large areas, making it necessary to handle a large tonnage of very low average grade, the successful solution has been found in some instances by a combined hydraulicking and milling; water under pressure being used as the mining agent, and also for transporting the broken material to the mills, and effecting in its passage a partial concentration of the product by washing out the lighter and looser dirt of the ore-mass. The placer-deposits of the South, which were the original localities from which gold was mined, have been extensively worked, and to any one now undertaking their development offer many difficulties. The antiquity of the industry in this field, which was the cradle (in fact, literally the rocker), in which the California '49-er was born, gives assurance that all the deposits available to water and natural drainage have been more or less extensively worked already, so that, as a rule, any placer-deposits yet remaining undeveloped may be considered to offer some difficulty beyond the ability of the " old-timer " to overcome.

Jan 1, 1897

THE Institute conducts jointly with the American Society of Civil Engineers, American Society of Mechanical Engineers and American Institute of Electrical Engineers, certain activities as listed below, and is joint owner with them of certain properties situated at 29 West 39th Street in New York City United Engineering Trustees, Inc. When Mr Carnegie made his gift, "for the erection of a suitable union home" for the engineering societies, United Engineering Trustees, Inc (then United Engineering Society) was chartered under Chapter 703, Laws of the State of New York, 1904, for "the advancement of the engineering arts and sciences in all their branches, and to maintain a free public engineering library" The Corporation was further empowered to acquire real and personal property and to use, maintain and occupy it, with the provision that any building erected by the Corporation shall be used perpetually as a meeting place and headquarters for the Founder Societies Thus the Carnegie gift realized the ideal of bringing the engineering societies together under one roof, and the Corporation through its members nominated in equal numbers by the four Founder Societies had the necessary authority to act for the Founder Societies in their joint interests in owning and operating for them not only Engineering Societies Building, but in the course of time, Engineering Societies Library, and

Jan 1, 1952

By Rossiter W. Raymond

I desire to call the attention of the Institute to an interesting experiment, which may turn out to be an indication of a valuable improvement in the manufacture of steel. As the members are aware, the addition of ordinary spiegeleisen, in the open hearth or Bessemer converter, to a bath of decarbonized iron, has a twofold object,—the recarbonization of the bath to a desired degree, and the remedy of the red shortness otherwise found to be inevitable in the final product. This red shortness is ascribed to the presence of oxide of iron in the molten metal; and it is supposed that the manganese of the spiegeleisen, uniting with the oxygen of such oxide, carries it into the slag. At the same time there is a small percentage of the manganese usually left in the cast steel, probably to the improvement of its quality. Whatever be the true explanation the effect of the manganese is acknowledged to be not only beneficial, but necessary. But the use of spiegeleisen containing high percentages of carbon limits the quantity that can be introduced, because the carbon must be limited if soft steel is desired. This inconvenience becomes so serious as to prevent the use of ordinary spiegeleisen in the manufacture of steel containing more than, say two-tenths per cent. of phosphorus; since the quality of the steel can be made tolerable only by reducing its contents of carbon in proportion as the

By Donald W. Gentry

Many firms in the minerals industry are facing enormous capital-equipment requirements for existing operations, planned expansion programs, pollution control systems, etc. Yet, because of existing economic conditions, mining companies find it increasingly difficult to obtain reasonable financing for the acquisition of large, high-cost capital equipment. One way of obtaining the use of mining and other major pieces of high-cost capital equipment is through leasing. The popularity of this approach is evidenced by the growing number of leasing companies, equipment manufacturers, and financial institutions now offering this service to their customers. Indeed, leasing has become a billion-dollar industry, and many commercial banks have developed sizeable portfolios in this area. "Should we buy or lease?" This question eventually comes up whenever a mining company needs additional major capital assets. Unfortunately, many buy-or-lease decisions are made on an emotional basis-rather than on a proper financial evaluation that would yield the…

Jan 9, 1975

By William Kent

A MOST startling and as yet unexplained, failure of steel boilerplates, in two different sets of boilers, is reported in a paper by Arthur J. Maginnis, published in the London Engineer, December 11th, 1885, and reprinted in the American Engineer, January 14th, 1386. The facts of the case, as condensed from Mr. Maginnis's paper and from a number of letters in the subsequent issues of the Engineer, are as follows: 1. The material used for two different sets of boilers on two different steamers, each set consisting of three circular boilers with horizontal steam-chests, passed all tests required by the Board of Trade

Jan 1, 1886

By H. M. Chance

THE present value of most coal properties resides largely in the coal remaining to be mined, which thus constitutes the most important asset. The object of this paper is to discuss methods commonly used in computing the value of mineable coal. To distinguish clearly between such coal values and the values of other property, the several kinds of property values may be divided into classes; this is necessary to avoid unintentional omissions of items of importance. VALUE OF COAL RESERVES Judicial decisions prescribe, and appraisers commonly accept, current sales value as the preferred means for determining the value of transferable property. With few exceptions a property is worth the sum that can be realized from its sale by a willing seller to a willing buyer, a sale in which compulsion urges neither party, and between whom there is no community of interest to fix a value; or it is worth at least as much as a responsible buyer will offer for it. Actual sales of like property or bids from responsible buyers for the property, or for substantially like property, are the best established methods for determining values. Only in the absence of such sales or bids can valuations by other methods be entertained, and only for reasons of weight can sales values be set aside. Sales of coal in the ground, as customarily carried out through lease, under royalty agreements, are therefore the most trustworthy means available for determining the value of coal reserves.

Jan 6, 1926

FRANK N. SPELLER,? Pittsburgh,. Pa.-Mr. -Hayward's paper again draws attention to the fact that copper in steel is not the enemy that a good many of us it one time thought it was. He shows clearly that steel with over 0.75 per cent. of copper is as dependable, under the :conditions which he describes, as the same steel without copper. I might add that you-can weld copper-steel- satisfactorily up to that point; in fact, we have succeeded in welding pipe by the lap weld process up to 1 per cent. copper. Notwithstanding the date that have been presented on the effects of copper on the physical properties and corrosion of steel, a maximum copper limitation is still found in many specifications. In some cases the limit is extremely low, such as below 0.05 .or 0.03: per cent., or thereabout. That is a relic of days gone by, and I think the practice should be discouraged. E. F. CONE, New York; N. Y.-Not so many years ago steel-casting makers were very particular as to the amount of copper that existed in the pig iron that they used. They would not use copper-bearing pig iron unless mixed with non-copper iron. I do not know what the practice now is in the particular foundry where I was metallurgist at one time,

Jan 4, 1918