Frank Coffee

“ A ship of, say, eight or ten thousand tons, making fourteen knots an hour, could often in fair weather do fifteen knots, but that extra mile an hour would probably cost in coal or oil consumption, $150 or $200 more in the twenty-four hours. Oil makes very little smoke when intelligently "fired." If you want to make a chief-engineer of an oil-burner jump, point out the volume of black smoke coming out of the steamer's smokestacks. He will make for the fire-room and raise Cain. A big volume of smoke shows waste of oil and bad combustion. ”

“ The petroleum of the Pacific and the Mexican coasts has as asphaltum base, while that obtained near the Atlantic has a paraffine base. When a ship is traveling in a cold latitude at a temperature of the water at 40 degrees above Fahrenheit, considerable difficulty is experienced in getting the oil through the pipes. ”

“ Again, bad time is often attributed to poor coal.
The human element is also to be reckoned with. Firemen get very thirsty and go ashore at way ports, where they may drink too much. This prevents a ship sailing at the advertised time, and so well is the Firemen's Union organized, that it will hold up a ship and not let her go until the last fireman is on board. ”