250 HEAVY-OIL ENGINES FOR MARINE PROPULSION. 
The heavy oil engine for commercial, marine and naval propulsion, will un- 
doubtedly be largely adopted in the near future, but I venture to predict that it will 
be in the form wherein much lower maximum pressures for both atomizing air and 
compression will obtain, where the mean effective pressure will be as high, the 
efficiency be as gocd, and the reliability of operation and repair cost much better 
than in any Diesel engine yet proposed. 
Mr. Joun Rep, Member:—I think there is a danger, from the discussion which 
has already taken place, that the Diesel engine will not get fair play. There is no 
question but that Mr. Davison is very optimistic. There isa lot of trouble in con- 
nection with the Diesel engine. Mr. Crane, on the other hand, goes off in another 
direction, and evidently thinks there is no hope of the utilization of the Diesel engine 
at all. That is a mistake, because the Diesel engine has got to be reckoned with, © 
and is coming along at a fast rate. 
I would like to refer to anactual job that I had something to dowith. ‘The boat 
is a canal barge for the Canadian Lakes, 250 by 42.6 by 20 feet. She had 14 feet 
draft. ‘There are two Diesel engines, reversible, of 200 horse-power each. ‘That 
boat went across the Atlantic from Middlesburg to Halifax, and made good, but 
had all kinds of troubles. One of the troubles that these engines are going to meet is 
that the naval architect will not take hold of them and alter his ship to suit the 
Diesel engine—he has not done so up to his time, but he will have todoit. You can 
put the Diesel engine where an ordinary steam engine would go, and think it will be 
all right, but oftentimes it will not be, because the vessel is not designed to use the 
engine, and you have got to make changes in the vessels, and make propellers to suit 
the Diesel engine, and the conditions generally must be made applicable to the ser- 
vice of the Diesel engine. You must get 85 per cent. efficiency to-day, but that is a 
thing which is not likely to occur in the case of all kinds of ships. We found with 
275 revolutions that we were hopelessly out of it, and expected to be out of it, but 
did not like to put in transmission gear to reduce the speed, because we wanted to 
have only one experiment at a time, and intend to experiment with the transmission 
gear later on. If you are to get the best results out of the full-power operation of 
the apparatus, then you must cut down in the revolutions, and you cannot do that 
with the Diesel engine and keep the weight down and keep the economy, and there- 
fore you have got to put in transmission gear. That is inevitable. 
Another thing—it is very important, I think, to be ready at any moment to 
make these fine adjustments, which several gentlemen referred to. You find one 
of the cylinders is beginning to skip, and you must set that cylinder to rights or you 
will get into trouble. 
One of the gentlemen asked about burning fuel at low speeds. That is the 
serious problem. The engine does not burn fuelat lowspeed. It is our experience 
if you back and fill with the engine, a certain amount of oil is left in the cylinder and 
it is not burned, and it either carbonizes or goes into the lubricating holes to wrist- 
pins, etc., and there hardens, and there are quite a few of these troubles which you 
are faced with, but they can be overcome, and are undoubtedly purely mechanical. 
