Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 184, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 21 August 1917 — WAR SPEEDS UP COALING SHIPS [ARTICLE]

WAR SPEEDS UP COALING SHIPS

No Port in World as Well Equipped as New York to Handle Work. SAVING IN TIME IS SHOWN "“'’l-.' High Speed Coal Dumpers and Lightera Simplify Work—lo.ooo Tons Can Be Loaded in Sixteen Hours. New York. —War has speeded up coaling of ships in the port of New York until no other port in the world at the present time is as well equlpSo fast has become the coaling of big vessels that enormous liners like the Imperator can have their bunkers filled to their capacity of 10,000 tons in 16 hours. The reason for the increased speed is largely high-speed coal dumpers and fuel lighters. Each' of the latter is able to give a ship 1,000 tons of coal in eight hours, an achievement due mainly to special coal elevating machinery. But ships requiring 1,000 tons or less are in the big majority, whether transatlantic or coastwise trade is considered. And it is not essential that for such ships there should be a loading device separate from the coal barges to enable a continuous stream of* barges to ply to and from coal dumping stations. In a Single Day. For the average vessel a total of 300 tons is usually sufficient, and this means that a ship of this sort may discharge a cargo and take on a new one all In the course of a single day. With the adoption of the modern lighter it Is an easy matter to load coal while the cargo is being unloaded and a new one taken on. One modern high-speed lighter can coal three such ships in an eight-hour day. This development of modern lighters is equalled by better facilities for transferring coal from cars to barges. Jliige steel dumping machines now take up a 50-ton car bodily, elevate It and empty Its contents Into the barge

hy tilting the entire car on the side—a great Improvement over the process of unlocking a trapdoor in the bottom of the car and letting the copl slide through. These machines have a capacity of 9,000 tons each a day. Saving of time to the shipowner here is shown by comparison with Cardiff, the English port where the largest tonnage of English cdal is loaded for export. In loading a vessel, for example, the English shipper uses a railroad car of ten or twelve tons, while the American uses one of fifty to ninety tons capacity, so that the Cardiff docks must discharge from five to ten carloads to every one discharged in New York in order to maintain the same speed. “Carried by Steel Colliers. Steel colliers ply between Boston and Hampton Roads, a distance of 600 miles. Each one of these ships is capable of making a round trip every week and transporting 350,000 tons of coal a year. A vessel of the same tonnage, however, carrying a cargo of coal from Cardiff to a port 600 miles away would take a week at Cardiff to load its cargo and another week at its destination to discharge it. Thus New York laden ships can make three trips to one for a Cardiff laden vessel. Such things as these are what places New York as the greatest port in the world and makes American coal operators feel that there is a great opportunity for exporting American coal. Five different companies within recent months have established fleets of specially designed carriers on the theory that with our tremendous coal supply and superior port facilities it

will only be a question of time before America Is shipping her coal to all parts of the globe.