30 CONSTRUCTION AND MANAGEMENT OF SMALL GASWORKS. 



CHAPTER IV. 



LAYING OUT THE DESIGN OF WORKS. 



THE chief thing to be borne in mind in connection with 

 the laying out of a design for a small works is that the 

 working and everyday conditions are peculiar to that class, 

 and altogether different from those at a works sufficient in 

 size to have a competent foreman always looking round, a 

 complete set of workshops on the premises, and a dozen 

 or more hands at call, in case of emergency. Under such 

 circumstances, a fracture, a stoppage, or other difficulty, can 

 be energetically attacked, and repairs quickly effected. I 

 have seen designs drawn up by qualified engineers that are 

 beyond criticism if they could be worked on the lines of 

 large works, but possess glaring defects when considered 

 from the present point of view. The small works is left 

 for hours at a time in the charge of one of that class of 

 men known as intelligent labourers, who has had no 

 extended experience or training at a gasworks, and perhaps 

 was never inside more than one in his life. He has 

 acquired, in a rule-of-thumb way, a knowledge of his duties 

 and of the use of simple tools, and can caulk a joint, fix a 

 clip on a cracked pipe, take down an ascension pipe, or 

 carry out such like simple operations. But even if qualified 

 to avail himself of it, he has not an equipped workshop or 

 a full kit of tools at hand, and the works may be in an 



