The Locomotive - Lighthouse Survival Blog

gO THE LOCOMOTIVE. [June,
Xt*tm*ti*
HARTFORD, JUNE 15, 1901.
J. M. Aj.j.ex, A.M., M.E.. Editor. A. D. Histeen, Associate Editor.
The Locomotive can be obtained free by calling at any of the company's agencies.
Subscription price 50 cents per year when mailed from this office.
Bound volumes one dollar each. [Any volume can be supplied.)
The thirtieth annual Report of the Schlesischer Yerein zur Ueberwachung von
Dampfkesselu, of Breslau, Germany, is at hand.
The New York aud Franklin Air Compressor Companies, of 95 Liberty street. New
York, have issued a joint catalogue (known as "Catalogue B") of the compressors aud
other devices that they manufacture and handle. It is very neatly gotten up.
We desire to acknowledge the thirty-first annual Report of the Norddeutscfaer
Yerein zur Ueberwachung von Dampfkesseln, of Hamburg, Germany, together with
several other interesting pamphlets from the same association, concerning its organiza-
tion and methods.
It is well known that we prepare plans and specifications for those of our patrons
who may wish to install new boilers, and that we are quite willing, also, to look the
new boilers over, previous to their acceptance, to make sure that they conform, so far
as can be seen, to the aforesaid plans and specifications upon which they were supposed
to be built. In reality we do much more than this; for our men have instructions,
whenever they are going near a shop in which such a boiler is building, to visit the
place and observe how the work is progressing, and whether, so far as can be seen, it is
being done in conformity with our requirements. But it is absurd to suppose that we
can certify, when the boiler is completed, that it is perfect in every respect. We can-
not certify to things that are invisible and undiscoverable by inspection, without keeping
a man in the boiler shop all the while that the boiler is building, so that he can keep an
eye on everything that is done. Tliis, Ave are confident, is not expected of us by any-
one; and consequently it cannot be held, when Ave inspect a new boiler and pronounce
it all right, that we are thereby relieving the boilermakcr from all further responsibility
for scamped work that looks right on the surface, nor for any other imperfection that is
due to his negligence or carelessness, and which, from its nature, cannot be discovered
by inspection. Our business is the insuring of steam boilers against explosion or nature;
aud we do not undertake to insure the honesty of a boilermaker. The right way
for an intending purchaser of a boiler to do, is to order his boiler of a first-class builder,
and to pay him a good, fair price for it. This procedure will ensure good faith on the
part of the builder, and a subsequent inspection by the Hartford Steam Boiler Inspec-
tion and Insurance Company will be an adequate provision against mistakes on his part.