The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1898-08-22
OUR BATTLESHIPS.
More Information About the Marvel
Gus Aggregation of Complexity.

American: Now, what sort of a
! structure is this: (battleship). A huge
steel honeycomb-frames and ribs and
! plates and braces in every direction.
I Look at the inextricable tangle of them
| in the shattered Maine. No more great
! eXpanSe of decks, with the tiers of guns
/ in diminishing perspective, such as one
J sees in the old wooden frigates and
! three deckerS. .b But compartments
/ everywhere-272 of them in the Indiana.
( Little steel boxes and big steel boxes
! boxes enclosing guns and boxes enclos-
/ ing engines, and a box for the helm
and labyrinthine passages in and out
Of and around them where daylight
never gets; and endless doors and
! matches on the Indiana, every one of
which somebody must look after and
see closed when the ship goes into ac-
! ton. Else why compartments if you
cannot keep them separate, so that if
water comes in from a ram thrust or
torpedo or shot. you can confine it to
one or two cells and so prevent the
ship from filing? There are more COM
partments in some of the small cruis-
ers-the Cincinnati has 478. but cr-uis-
ers run and battleships do not, says
the Independent.
In this assemblage of cells is placed
damned is a better word-one of the
most complicated aggregations of
mechanism that have ever been
! brought together. There are from 100
to $50 steam cylinders in the multifar-
ious engines; not so many as in the
cruisers, perhaps. The Columbia has
1874, but the Columbia keeps out of the
way of 13-inch shot. The battleShip
Iowa has 49, The New Ironsides, the
most powerful fighting vessel in our
navy at the close of the last war, had
just three.
What steam does not do electricity
does. There are wires everywhere. The
dynamoS are running constantly, for
the closed steel boxes get no daylight
and must be lighted, while with equal
constancy the blowers draw out the
foul and force in the fresh air But on
all sides there is machinery. Machines
work the guns; machines propel and
pump the ship and feed the boilers and
drive the fires; machines hoist ammu-
milton, boats and anchors; machines
find the position of the enemy; ma
chimes transmit orders from the cap
tain to every part of the structure; ma
chimes make the light; machines con-
dense the drinking water and cool it:
machines, themselves propelled by other
machines on board, go out under water
to blow up the adversary
That is the thing-11, 600 tons mainly
OF steel cells, cranlmed with mechar-
ism of extreme complexity. and which
stays aflcat only as long as a certain
number Of the larger amidship cells
remain water tight; that is, the thing
which is called battleship. and that is
the thing which is the subject Of the
coming experiment, upon the result of
which may depend national victory or
defeat.
The more complex any mechanical
structure the greater the liability TO
arrangement. Like any chain it's
strength or efficiency is that of it's
weakest link: Just as in the animal
organizations the higher the develop
ment the more varied and numerous
its diseases. 1t follows inevitably,
therefore, that whether in a battleship
or a bridge. or a building, or any ether
engineering linkage of many cooper
ating parts. high specialization car
ries with it increased liability to in
jury, until the latter overbalances. The
battleship experiment will determine
whether or not the limit in the war
vessel has been passed. Battleships
are not designed as are buildings and
bridges. The sizes of the members of
a viaduct properly to resist all fore
seen strains and stresses can be pre-
figured. and abundant margin left to
cover all accidents by multiplying the
result by. say, ten" the so-called fac
tor of safety. But battleships have no
factor OF safety. nor would bridges. If
anyone expected that a blow of several
thousand foot tons concentrated in the
space of a square foot would come
crashing against any part Of them at