A SHEET OE LETTER PAPER MAY MOVE A TON A MILE.

Thames Star, Volume XVI, Issue 5039, 7 March 1885, Page 3

A SHEET OE LETTER PAPER MAY MOVE A TON A MILE.

The modern cargo steamer has now become' a wonderfully economical freight carrier, especially as regards consumption of fuel. A freight train run under the most favorable conditions seems wasteful *in caparison' The Burgos, a modern steamer especially built to carry cargo at "a slow speed, lately left England for China with a cargo weighing 5,6C0,0001b5. Daring the first part of the voyage from Plymouth to Alexandria, the consumption of coal was 282,2401b5, the distance being 3380 miles. The consumption per mile was therefore only 83 51b, and the conn sumption,per ton of cargo per mile 0 0281b! "In other words half-an-ounce of coal propelled one ton of cargo one mile. Assuming that paper is as efficient a fuel as coal, we hare, says the "Railroad Gazette" only to burn a letter on board this steamer to generate and utilise enough, energy to transport one ton of freight one mile. It is difficult to realise that such a trifling act as burning a letter involves such a waste of useful energy, or can bare any reference to the energy sufficient to perform a feat which, under less favorable circumstances, requires a couple of horses and a teamster for about halfan-hour. ; The best locomotive performance on the American lines of which there is any authentic record gives a consumption of about two ounces of coal per ton of freight, hauled one mile at the rate of 13 miles an hour, including stoppages. On lines having grades of from 53ft to 70ft per mile, the consumption rises to five or more ounces * of: coal per ton of freight hauled one mile. , ,- The engines oftfbe Burgos are on what . is termed the triple compound system,

the steam being expanded in threa cylinders in succession. The boiler pressure is 160)bs per square icch. The average speed at sea in all weather is very nearly 10' miles an hour.