chkiss quick-firing and revolver guns and four
torpedo tubes, one forward, one aft, and one on each side.

The crew of the Marceau has been fixed at 600 men, and the cost is
stated to have been about $3,750,000.--_Engineering_.

* * * * *

[Continued from SUPPLEMENT, No. 820, page 13097.]

A REVIEW OF MARINE ENGINEERING DURING THE PAST DECADE.[1]

[Footnote 1: Paper read before the Institution of Mechanical Engineers,
July 28, 1891.]

BY MR. ALFRED BLECHYNDEN, OF BARROW-IN-FURNESS

_Steam Pipes_.--The failures of copper steam pipes on board the Elbe,
Lahn, and other vessels have drawn serious attention both to the
material and to the modes of construction of the pipes. The want of
elastic strength in copper is an important element in the matter; and
the three following remedies have been proposed, while still retaining
copper as the material. First, in view of the fact that in the operation
of brazing the copper may be seriously injured, to use solid drawn
tubes. This appears fairly to meet the main dangers incidental to
brazing; but as solid drawn pipes of over 7 inches diameter are
difficult to procure, it hardly meets the case sufficiently. Secondly,
to use electrically deposited tubes. At first much was promised in this
direction; but up to the present time it can hardly be regarded as more
than in the experimental stage. Thirdly, to use the ordinary brazed or
solid drawn tubes, and to re-enforce them by serving with steel cord or
steel or copper wire. This has been tried, and found to answer
perfectly. For economical reasons, as well as for insuring the minimum
of torsion to the material during manufacture, it is important to make
as few bends as possible; but in practice much less difficulty has been
experienced in serving bent pipes in a machine than would have been
expected. Discarding copper, it has been proposed to substitute steel or
iron. In the early days of the higher pressures, Mr. Alexander Taylor
adopted wrought iron for steam pipes. One fitted in the Claremont in
February, 1882, was recently removed from the vessel for experimental
purposes, and was reported upon by Mr. Magnus Sandison in a paper read
before the Northeast Coast Institution of Engineers and Shipbuilders.[2]
The following is a summary of the facts. The pipe was 5 inches external
diameter, and 0.375 inch thick. It was lap welded in the works of
Messrs. A. & J. Stewart. The flanges were screwed