774 



The Weekly Florists' Review. 



April 24. 1908. 



house, provided he could secure a per- 

 fect circulation, which can only be done 

 by dropping the boiler, and there is no 

 good reason why such dropping of the 

 boiler could not be done, as the making 

 of a water-tight cellar is a very simple 

 and inexpensive vmdertaking. 



If, however, he does not wish to un- 

 dertake the dropping of the boiler, the 

 only remedy would be to raise the head- 

 er to as high a point as is possible and 

 then run four lines of 2-inch pipe along 

 the house, say one attached to the pur- 

 lin of each slope of the roof and the 

 other two on the center column, giving 

 them a fall of at least 1 foot to the far 

 end of the house, then dropping as near 

 vertically as possible, each pipe connect- 

 ing to one of the 4-inch returns, keeping 

 the returns up as close to the bottom of 

 the bench as would be practicable and 

 running back to the boiler end with a fall 

 of about 1 foot, then making a vertical 

 drop to the return connection of the 

 boiler. This will increase the heating 

 surface in the house, but is necessary in 

 view of the slow and consequently in- 

 effective circulation attainable. 



Means for expansion and for relief of 

 air must be provided above the level of 

 the header as in any other system. Mr. 

 M. must bear in mind, in considering the 

 reinstallation of his apparatus, that he 

 consumes more coal and consequently re- 

 quires more labor in running the heat- 

 ing plant defectively installed than he 

 would with the properly arranged ap- 

 paratus having a boiler pit 2 or 3 feet 

 deeper. 



New York. Henry W. Gibbons. 



MORE ABOUT PIPE. 



(Road by A. E. Ford, of Ford & KendiR Co.. 

 Philadelphia, before the Florists' Club of Phila- 

 delphia. April 1, l',i02.J 



Your genial secretary in extending his 

 official invitation was kind enough to 

 originate the title "More About Pipe," 

 but failed to advise on what point you 

 wished for more information than you 

 uow possess. I am, therefore, led to 

 conjecture that you may possibly desire 

 to have the benefit of what knowledge I 

 may have gained of both the manufac- 

 ture and vending of wrought pipe, and 

 will govern myself accordingly. 



The manufacture of wrought pipe, 

 while being of special interest to those 

 who are interested in its production and 

 sale, is of more than passing moment to 

 Philadelphians, for the reason that it 

 was in this city that the first machlne- 

 it;ade pipe was manufactured in Amer- 

 ica under patents secured from England, 

 about the year 1835, an industry that 

 afterward had an enormous development 

 and became a prominent feature in the 

 business of this great industrial city. 

 I'rior to the time stated, pipe had been 

 made by hand in England and here, and 

 was necessarily very expensive, so that 

 Then gas was first introduced into Phila- 

 delphia old gun barrels were used as a 

 substitute until the supply became ex- 

 lausted. 



■With regard to the original makers of 

 v. rf'Ught pipe in this country, there seems 

 to be some uncertainty, the claim having 

 been made by Mr. Samuel Griffith, who 

 had a furnace on the site of what is now 

 L'T North Seventh street, and by Morris, 

 Tn.'--ker & Morris, who were located at 

 Third and Pear streets, where they car- 

 lict". on a foundry business and made a 

 specialty of the manufacture of stoves, 

 ranges, heaters, etc. It is no province of 

 mino to endeavor to establish as to which 

 of these claims was correct, but as Mr. 



Griffith never reached a point much be- 

 yond his original venture, and Jlorris, 

 Tasker & Co. ex"panded to such an extent 

 as to become at one time the absolute 

 controllers of the pipe industry, I shall 

 deal with that firm in making further 

 comparisons. 



It is, of course, understood that all 

 wrought pipe made and used at the time 

 iricntioned was "iron and butt welded," 

 the commercial lengths being about 12 

 feet, and the gross product of this in- 

 faut industry about ten tons per week. 

 And in order to protect same in a meas- 

 ure from foreign competition, it was de- 

 cided to adopt a different standard of 

 threads to be known as the "American 

 gauge," which at this day necessitates 

 our makers using the English threads on 

 all pipe intended for export. From this 

 small beginning has grown up one of the 

 great industries of this country, which 

 gives us a practical illustration of our 

 marvelous industrial growth, wiiich does 

 uow tnd will still further in the future 

 enable us to dominate the markets of the 

 world. The present production of 

 wrought tubular goods in America is not 

 less than 5,000 tons per day, a capacity 

 which equals at least that of England 

 and Germany combined. Where the orig- 

 iu.Tl range of sizes was from one-half 

 inch to one inch, we now manufacture 

 from one-half inch to thirty inches, the 

 larger sizes being "lap welded" instead 

 of "butt welded." 



The growth has, of course, been grad- 

 ual, and much of it has been attained 

 since the introduction of steel as a factor 

 in pipe making, which was first done 

 successfully in 1885 by Mr. P. ,1. Hearne 

 at Wheeling, W. Va., this gentleman now 

 being the president of the National Tube 

 Co., which is one of the constituent com- 

 panies of the United States Steel Corpo- 

 ration. This innovation you will readily 

 understand was vigorously combated by 

 the makers of iron pipe, but slowly but 

 surely steel has forced its way until it is 

 to-day more of a king in the industrial 

 v.orld than cotton ever was. 



I think, gentlemen, I hiive now reached 

 the point which I understand was the 

 subject of former discussion and possibly 

 differences of opinion, and I wish to say 

 that any sentiments which I may express 

 simply represent my individual experi- 

 ence and judgment. To my mind there 

 is no question that iron pipe as origi- 

 nall}' made from Al quality of pig iron 

 was, for some purposes, superior to the 

 present soft steel article manufactured 

 by the Bessemer process, but unfortu- 

 nately commercial conditions have made 

 it impossible to procure such pipe except 

 at a price which would be practically 

 prohibitive to the ordinary user, and we, 

 therefore, have to .choose between a so- 

 called wrought iron pipe, which is manu- 

 factured largely from scrap iron, and 

 which frequentl.y contains a mixture of 

 hard steel which unfits it for many uses, 

 particularly when you have to cut it up, 

 and a pipe of pure steel. 



In making this statement relative to 

 iion pipe, you will itnderstand that 1 am 

 making no charge of any unfairness on 

 the part of the manufacturers, as it is 

 absolutely necessary for them to bring 

 the cost of their product down to a point 

 where they can make such selling prices 

 as will enable them to compete with the 

 cheaper article. In other words, it has 

 become a choice largel.v between "good 

 steel pipe" and "uncertain iron pipe," 

 and my individual leaning is toward the 

 former. Even if it were possible to get 



the kind of iron pipe "our fathers used," 

 there would still be many uses for which 

 steel would be preferable, particularly 

 where tensile strength is to be considered. 

 To more readily understand the differ- 

 ences between iron and steel pipe, it 

 might possibly be well to explain tersely 

 the difference in their production. 



In making iron pipe originally a high 

 grade of pis; iron was used, same being 

 puddled by" hand labor into what is 

 termed "muck bar." This is then pUed 

 into fagots, which in turn are rolled into 

 sheets of the proper diameter for each 

 size, the term for which is "pipe skelp." 

 This skelp is then brought to the welding 

 furnaces and brought to a finished condi- 

 tion. 



The difference in making steel pipe is, 

 of course, in the processes previous to its 

 reaching the welding furnaces, where the 

 «ork is practically the same. The steel 

 process of to-day has simply changed the 

 irianufacture of the raw material from 

 hard labor to a mechanical manipulation 

 of the original melting stock, the only 

 dift'erenee being that the steel ingot is 

 cast and consequently devoid of the fiber 

 which you find in iron. The steel pipe, 

 owing to this process, has much more 

 tensile strength than iron, and is, there- 

 fore, much more suitable for high pres- 

 sure work. Iron pipe, when made as it 

 should be, is undoubtedly more ductile 

 than steel as made at present, but if, as 

 claimed, there is at least two-thirds scrap 

 placed in the puddling furnace, the result 

 mu.st be a bar which is hard and un-uni- 

 form, in consequence of which the skelp 

 of which this pipe is made does not pos- 

 sess the ductile and welding qualities 

 which formerly . distinguished the iron 

 pipe. 



I have not touched on the matter of 

 corrosion, because that becomes at times 

 a matter largely of local conditions. I 

 have seen cases where iron pipe did not 

 give as good satisfaction as steel, and 

 others where the reverse was the case, so 

 that 1 think it is only fair to leave that 

 question an open one. There is another 

 point in this connection, which, while it 

 may not specially interest the members 

 of tills club, is an important one to the 

 u=ers of wrought pipe, and that is the 

 matter of "electrolysis." While I have 

 no special data on this subject, I have 

 heard it stated, without contradiction, 

 that wrought steel pipe will show less Im- 

 pairment from electrical action than 

 wrought or cast iron pipe. 



In conclusion, gentlemen, I think that 

 the efforts of the future will not be with 

 a desire to make iron pipe to compete 

 v.itli steel at the expense of the quality 

 et the former, but rather to so improve 

 the quality of the steel product as to 

 make it equal in every respect to the iron 

 pipe which was formerly made under 

 more favorable conditions than now ex- 

 ist, leaving iron pipe to occupy the same 

 comparative position relative to steel pipe 

 as other iron products do to similar arti- 

 cles of steel. 



NEW CARNATIONS IN 

 CALIFORNIA. 



Probably no city in the United States 

 is today supplied with finer carnation 

 blooms than is San Francisco. Cal. The 

 writer recently paid a visit to the 

 metropolis of the Pacific coast and was 

 very much surprised at the excellence of 

 the stock in the florists' windows, and 

 cspeciall.y so those shown by .John H. 

 Sievers & Co. Sicvers' carnations are 

 well known on the Pacific coast, but not 



