Evening Republican, Volume 14, Number 211, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 September 1910 — Cutting Up Battleships. [ARTICLE]

Cutting Up Battleships.

Formerly the cutting up of huge masses of steel like the armor belt on old battleships was a Herculean Job, costing much time, money and use of powerful machinery. To tear up an old battleship was the labor of months, requiring the careful cutting of no end of rivets and laborious chiseling and hammering. Such a job canVrow be done in a jiffy by a big blowpipe, in which air and coal gas are burned under pressure. Two fine nozzles close together do the job. Or, If coal gas is not handy, acetylene or gasoline vapor can be used. Of course, the blowpipe is connected to the gas holder by a strong rubber hose. With the gas lighted and the air turned on, the hardest steel runs off like a bar of melting wax. The cut is surprisingly clean and smooth, the metal in no way being injured. The same sure way can be used in the cutting down of big trees and big, thick timber, ipstead of the slower and more expensive ax and saw. It can be used instead of drills and chisels in drilling holes and planing off rough steel. It greatest disadvantage is difficulty in getting coal gas, but the gasoline takes its place pretty well.