212 STANDARDIZATION AS AFFECTING THE 
adjustment to particular cases. These specifications should follow in arrangement the yard 
charge and plan numbering system, so that an index is unnecessary to one familiar with the 
system, thus saving more time for more people than will be realized. The index should be 
there for convenience of owners and others not acquainted with the system. 
It seems hardly necessary to say that all forms and drawings should be uniform, also all 
calculations, material-orders and correspondence methods. The responsibilities and limi- 
tations of each department should be clearly defined and no point left in the air to fall hap- 
less between two or more parties. 
STANDARD DETAILS AND FITTINGS. 
We now come to standard details. Each established yard now has its own standards and 
each owner has his own particular requirements. Each yard wants to use its own standards, 
which works for a cheaper ship. 
The British have decided that there is no good reason why a lot of fittings and equip- 
ment cannot be nationally standardized and, having decided so, they are doing it. There is 
a host of fittings that lend themselves to this treatment, such as manholes, airports, doors, 
davits, boats, bitts, cleats, chocks, sanitary fittings, winches, windlasses, anchors, chains, steer- 
ing gears, etc., down to minor fittings such as cups and saucers. Providing the standards are 
ofa good quality and agreed upon by the jointly interested parties, why not eliminate as much 
special work as we can? This British experiment is well worth noting as we press on our 
way to the building of ships economically. 
With standardized fittings it is easy to see both time and money saved; stocks can be 
kept fuller without fear of loss. 
STANDARD MACHINERY. 
With reference to machinery, we have just arrived at standard specifications for mod- 
erate-powered, reciprocating-engined, Scotch-boilered cargo boats. We arrived there, how- 
ever, in the midst of the modern upheaval in methods of propulsion; the claims of Diesel 
drives, Diesel-electric drives; electric, hydraulic or mechanical reduction-gear drives, direct- 
turbine drives, watertube boilers versus cylindrical, also last, but scarcely least, the war. 
The standard specifications here referred to are those prepared in Britain with a view to 
harmonizing classification and governmental requirements for main engines and boilers and 
giving to builders one set of rules and specifications to work to. What success has attended 
their practical working is not known to the writer. 
The reconciling of classification and governmental requirements where these overlap is 
something which will save time and money; the application of two or three formulae to 
figure out the same dimension involves duplication of effort and, consequently, waste. 
Motors for ship propulsion are a modern development. We already find elaborate stand- 
ardization here for several reasons; with uniform power per cylinder, engines of four, six 
or eight cylinders are built. Oil engines are complex affairs at the best; the more parts to 
a given design the lower the already high cost per unit of power can be kept. Further, 
their manufacture commenced at a period when the benefits of standardization were already 
realized. 
Electricity plays an increasingly important part in the auxiliary installations aboard 
