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T H E J O C R N A L OF I N D U S T R I A L A N D ENGINEERING C H E M I S T R Y
to have many advantages, since, calculating on ammonia values, and on present prices of acid, labor, etc., it can easily be shown t h a t the manufacture of strong ammonia is more profitable. There are, however, many objections t o it, and the most import a n t of these is that the demand is limited. Strong ammonia is used principally for certain trade purposes; and if the supply is increased t o any extent, the price will certainly fall, and then the profit is such that sulfate making will pay better. Then, too, the trade ’in strong ammonia is almost entirely in the hands of one or two large firms, who, if necessary, could easily squeeze out a smaller and less powerful competitor. In the writer’s opinion, with acid a t $19 per ton, sulfate making is by far the safer proposition. I t is not unlikely that one result of the scarcity will be to encourage the owners of large coke-oven plants t o put up their own sulfuric acid plants, and, moreover, to supply their own sulfur requirements largely, if not entirely, by purifying their gas from sulfuretted hydrogen by means of oxide of iron.
A GASHOLDER WITHOUT A WATER TANK Early this year a description was given in the Journal f u r Gasbeleaichtung of a type of gasholder having no water tank, which has been designed by the Augsburg-Xuremberg Engineering Works (generally known in Germany by the initials “hI. A . N.”). The difficulty of keeping a dry seal in sound condition is very great; it does not follow, however, that because a waterseal equal t o the holder pressure of 4 to 8 in cannot well be
Vol. 7, No. g
of the seal escaping through the intervening fissure, or a t least reduces the loss t o trifling proportions. Any such loss of water from the seal is made good by water flowing from the feed tank E, which again is filled up automatically from the annular receiver G by the pump H and the rising main I. As there is no loss of the liquid used for the seal, any suitable liquid may be employed in place of water; ordinary gas tar has been found very good for the purpose, and has the advantage that it is unnecessary to warm it to prevent freezing in winter time. Tar and similar liquids pass only to a very slight extent through the very na row slit, especially as the pressure is kept nearly the same on both sides of the holder partition. Measurements have shown that, with a holder of 880,000 cubic feet capacity, the pumping of the tar used as a sealing material would entail an expenditure of only 0.1 H. P. on the average, when it has been calculated that with power costing $0.022 per B. T. U. the annual expense of pumping would be only 3 per cent of the customary expense (in Germany) of heating a gasholder having water-sealed cups The cost of erecting the new type of holder on unfavorable ground is very much lower than that of a holder with water tank, as the load on the foundations is comparatively trifling. S o inside painting of the holder is required, since the walls on the inside are protected by the tar. The outside also is not exposed t o the ill effects of tank-water, and is dealt with in the same way as any exposed iron structure. The holder may be enlarged a t any time by merely extending upwards its wall A. In appearance it is better than an ordinary telescopic gasholder. An experimental holder of t h e new type has been erected a t the Gustavburg works and one of 45,000 cubic feet capacity is in course of erection a t the Augsburg works, the contract price being the same as that of a n enclosed holder of the ordinary type of half the capacity. ~~
AMERICAN COPPER The smelter production of primary copper in the United States last year was I,I 50,137,192 lbs., as compared with 1,224,484,098 lb. in 1913, showing a decrease of rather more than 6 per cent. The total value of last year’s output, taking a n average of 13I/a cents per lb., was SI52,968,246, as compared with $189,795,035 in 1913. The greatest State production last year was effected in Arizona with 382,449,922 lbs.; Montana came second with 236,805,845 lbs.; Utah third with 160,589,360 lbs.; and Michigan fourth with 158,009,748 lbs. New Mexico had a production cf 64,204,703 lhs. last year, and Xevada produced 60,122,904 lbs. California turned out 29,784,173 lbs., and Alaska 24,985,847 lbs. No other state reached a production of 20,000,000 lbs. in 1914. Refined copper was exported from the United States in I914 to the extent of 748,902,137 lbs.; the corresponding exports in 1913 were 817,911,424 lbs.
.k GERMAN .G.4SHOLDER
WITHOUT A W A T E R
TAAK
A-\V‘all of Holder B-Partition Travelling Vertically C-Liquid Seal D-Sliding Block E-Liquid Feed-Tank F-Feed-Pipe G-Receiver H-Pump I-Rising Main for Liquid
dispensed with, it is necessary t o retain a tank having a depth of 30 feet or more. In the tank described the depth of the waterseal is merely slightly greater than the gas pressure. The illustration shows the design of the new holder, for which a German patent has been obtained. The water-seal C travels with the disc or ring B, and keeps the holder gas-tight in that direction, while the traveling slide or block D prevents the water
THE GALICIAN PETROLEUM INDUSTRY About 80 per cent of the aggregate production of petroleum in Galicia comes from the Drohobys, Broyslav, and Tustanowice concerns, and, perhaps owing t o the fact that a great deal of English, French, and Belgian capital is invested in these undertakings, they have not suffered much during the Russian OCCUpation [Engineering, 99 (191j ) , 6891. Considerable stocks, stated t o amount t o about I,OOO,OOO tons, which were intended for railway fuel, were found in the stores of the naphtha companies. Some of the petroleum refineries, which, all told, number about sixty, situated in Central Galicia and on the slopes of the Carpathians, notably Limanova and Mariampol, belonging t o the Galician Carpathian Petroleum Company, have been entirely or partly destroyed by fire. The mining department of Petrograd recently despatched a commission of experts to Galicia in order t o investigate and report on the country’s petroleum industry, its value for Russia, and its position, as
