1867.] Engineering — Civil and Mechanical. 535 



the bar of the Mississippi offers to navigation. The system which 

 this company proposes to apply to the relief of ships consists of an 

 apparatus of caoutchouc, forming a kind of floating dock, which 

 will he manoeuvred with the aid of two tugs. The company hopes 

 by this means to raise to the extent of 8 feet ships drawing 20 feet 

 of water, and to enable them to go over the bar in less than three 

 hours. 



The drainage works of Eastbourne have recently been com- 

 pleted and opened. 



On the subject of docks, &c, we have to report the admission 

 of water into the Millwall Docks, on the Thames, on 29th August 

 last. On the 1st idem, the first stone of the new graving dock at 

 Malta was laid ; this dock, when completed, will be the largest ever 

 constructed, its dimensions being — length, 468 feet; width, 104 

 feet, and depth, 39 feet. A new slip dock has recently been opened 

 on the Clyde, capable of taking in ships of 2,000 tons ; it is 850 feet 

 long, and 57 feet broad. A new floating railway pier at Burnt- 

 island, which has been under construction for the past two years, 

 has just been completed. The pier commences about 330 yards 

 east of the Burntisland passenger station, and extends for 1,000 

 feet in a south-westerly direction, thus forming a harbour which is 

 accessible at all states of the tide. 



A process is now being carried out by Messrs. Whitworth, of 

 Manchester, of subjecting steel to a high pressure during the 

 process of casting ; the object being to obtain sounder castings, and 

 to do away with the necessity for great "heads" of metal. Mr. 

 Whitworth is also endeavouring by hydrostatic pressure to effect the 

 rolling, or otherwise shaping, under pressure, of cast-steel in the 

 liquid state. Mr. A. L. Holley, of Harrisburg, U.S., has recently 

 patented a plan for casting Bessemer steel ingots from the bottom 

 instead of from the top as is usual ; and it is found that ingots 

 thus cast are square and sound at the top as well as at the bottom, 

 and they are more free from cracks and external honeycombs, and 

 much smoother than ingots cast from the top. 



A new form of tyre-lathe has recently been introduced by 

 Messrs Greenwood, of Leeds, which has been designed to facilitate 

 the boring of railway tyres, by enabling the whole operation to be 

 completed without shifting the work in the machine, the arrange- 

 ment being such that cutting tools can be simultaneously brought 

 into action on the opposite faces of the tyre, and also on its inner 

 surface. 



VOL. IV. 2 N 



