The fortnightly meeting of the Engineering Society for China was held in the rooms of the Royal Asiatic Society on the Ist instant, a large number of members attending to hear a paper on the Diese! Engine, by Mr. E. A. Vickery, manager of the gen and Drum Co.'s factory at Shanghai. The history of the Diesel engine, and the techni ties of its construction and working were thoroughly detailed by the lecturer, the address being a very able one. In the course of his remarks, Mr. Vickery observed that the chief advantages of the Diesel engine were that it could be started without preliminary heating, "stand-by" losses being thereby avoided, and it consumed a low-grade liquid fuel, needing less than the mount of fuel necessary for engines of other types. The ther—mal efficiency of the engine was high, the utmost use being got out of the fuel used. It needed a comparatively small engine-room staff, and with an equal amount of fuel, was capable of travelling five tim for as a vessel fitted with engines of the ordinary type, One kind of fuel used was petroleum residue, hitherto a waste-product thrown away after petroleum, benzine, paraffin-wax, and lubricating had been extracted. The largest Diesel engine yet built for land Purposes was of 4,000 h.p. Many naval vessels were now fitted with this engine. Some experimental sets are being put into British cruisers, and practically all submarines of the latest type are fitted with Diesel engines, including those which have taken part in recent engagements in the North Sea.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.