Excerpt from Stevens Mechanical Catechism
Almost every day some new device is invented for saving labor or fuel or other material. Where so many brains, scientifically trained, and so many thousands of practiced eyes and hands combine to make human life more comfortable, by shifting an ever larger portion of the hard labor to the shoulders of Nature's hidden forces, it is not strange that the engineer and machinist finds greater and greater demands made on his intelligence and experience.
A widely-known machinist delights in repeating to his friends his account of a little incident that will illustrate our point. He happened to enter the office of a large factory, where one of the firm jumped at him and hustled him into the engine-room, where the men tending the machinery were standing idle and puzzled. Something was wrong! "Start her up," said the proprietor. The big engine made two or three revolutions, giving a thump at each turn as if the fly wheel was about to go to pieces. "Stop her!" the machinist said, took the key of shaft and fly-wheel out, filed it down one sixty-fourth of an inch, and then drove it in place again -and she started up without a thump. "Well, I declare," said the proprietor, "how much do I owe you?" "Twenty-five dollars and fifty cents." "What's that, sir -$25.50 for twenty minutes of your time?" "No, sir; 50 cents for my time and $25 for knowing just what to do. It's worth that much to you, I dare say, to get your men to work, isn't it?" The money was cheerfully paid.
About the Publisher
Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com
This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works. Это и многое другое вы найдете в книге Stevens Mechanical Catechism (Classic Reprint)