The report of the "Standard Wiring Table Committee" presented at a meeting of the Institute Nov. 18th, 1890, was referred by the Council to the regular committee on "Units and Standards," and has been somewhat modified, particularly in regard to the correction for temperature. Committee on Units and Standards. A. E. KENNELLY, Chairman, GEO A. HAMILTON, GEO B. PRESCOTT, JR. Appendix IV. embodying an international system of notation and conventional symbols for designating different quantities, suggested to the last Congress by Mr. E. Hospitalier of Paris will be published hereafter. CARL HERING, Chairman, Sub-Committee on Provisional Programme. AMERICAN INSTITUTE OF ELECTRICAL ENGINEERS. NEW YORK, January 17th, 1893. The seventy-third meeting of the Institute was held this date, at 12 West Thirty-first street. The Secretary of the Institute called the meeting to order, and said: I have just received a note from President Sprague, saying that he was just out of a sick-bed and expected to be ordered back again, and that it would not be prudent for him to be out this evening. We have with us the senior Vice-President, from Boston, Mr. Lockwood, who, I presume, will be willing to take the Chair, as he has frequently done. At the meeting of Council this afternoon the following associate members were elected. The following associate members were transferred to full membership. CHURCHILL, ARTHUR Electrician, Cable and Wire Department, General HERRICK, CHARLES H. Manager and Engineer, Wright Engineering Co, 196 WELLS, DOUGLAS SCOTT, CHARLES F. MARVIN, HARRY N. Total, 5. Summer St., Boston, Mass. Late Supt. of Telegraphs and Engineer to Government, Assistant Electrician, Westinghouse Electric and Mfg. In Electric Percussion Drill Work, General Electric Co., MR. LOCKWOOD, upon taking the Chair, said: Gentlemen, Members of the Institute and guests: as Mr. Haskins, the speaker of the evening, comes from New England, it seems perhaps in order that a brother of the Eastern Star, like myself, should preside this evening, and hence I have less hesitation in presiding than I otherwise should have. Some of you may have already, from advance copies, read the paper. All of us, I am sure, will be interested in following Mr. Haskins as he reads his paper; and although he stated to me a few moments ago that he was something of a crank on meters, I would like to remark before he starts that we must not forget that it is the cranks that make the wheels go round. With these few preliminary remarks, I commend him to your tender mercies, and I am sure he will feel that the more thoroughly you discuss his paper after he finishes reading it, the better he will like it. There is nothing equal to a counter-irritant for getting all the real good there is, out of a medicine. ing of the American Institute of Electrical Engineers, New Yorh, January 17, 1893.1 VicePresident Lockwood in the Chair. ELECTRICAL RECORDING METERS. BY CARYL D. HASKINS. It was my first intention to present this paper on Electrical Recording Meters" or "Electricity Meters" in the form of a strictly technical monograph, dealing with each of the more prominent theories of meter construction separately and fully. Upon outlining this plan, it at once became evident that to do so I should be obliged to devote some four or five hundred pages of closely written manuscript to my subject matter, and should have been obliged to deliver the final three quarters of my paper during the early morning hours succeeding the session. I therefore changed my plan, and now propose to briefly describe and discuss the leading elements which, singly or combined, have gone to make up the typical meters which have been presented to the public up to the present time. I find myself limited to generalities, and strictly technical considerations have necessarily been neglected that the field might be approximately covered. A brief history of the evolution of the electric meter would be very appropriate, but repetition is odious, and I beg to refer all who are interested in the early history and genealogy of the meter to that most interesting and complete paper on this subject read before the Institute by Mr. George W. Walker, May 21st, 1891. The earliest meter patent was granted in 1872 to Mr. S. Gardiner, Jr., of New York City, and the principle of a magnetic or electro-magnetic release for a simple clock movement, is preserved in two or three so-called time-counters to-day, and is doubtless very useful for many purposes; as for example in the Spaulding clock for registering the hours of use of a motor, or in 1. Transactions, vol. viii., p. 351. other similar devices for registering the hours of use of arc circuits. These devices I shall neglect; they are not meters within the true sense of the word, and their simplicity is obvious. Before undertaking any description, a few words may be appropriately devoted to the question of the unit by which it is most desirable to measure electrical power in use. The ampere has been, perhaps is to-day, the popular unit for the measurement of electricity supplied; yet, on careful consideration, how very meaningless for work of this kind, is the ampere unit. It would only find a parallel in the very ingenious early settler of Maryland, who bought six linear miles of land from the trusting Indians. Had we but one standard voltage in use for lighting and for power, and for other purposes, no unit could be better than the ampere-hour for meter measurement; but unfortunately or fortunately, as the case may be, there is scarcely a potential, between 5 and 2,000 volts, which does not more or less imperatively call for measurement by meter to day, and if the ampere unit is to be retained, then it will become necessary to reconcile ourselves to the use of an endless number of constants, or to a still more endless schedule of ampere-hour rates. We wish to measure power delivered; in fact we wish to know how much coal a group of lamps is consuming. This points directly to the watt, and I venture to assert that careful consideration will invariably show that the watt is the only true unit for the measurement of electricity by meter. Unless, perchance, we adopt the cubic foot, as has at least one central station in the United States; a very amusing but equally practical demonstration of American ingenuity. The earliest successful meters if we consider classes rather than individual instruments, were the chemical meters, closely followed by thermo-meters. The chemical meter is obviously capable of giving most accurate results: in fact, with proper manipulation, it is very doubtful whether any measuring device, which has up to to-day been designed, could more correctly sum up passing current. It is in the manipulation and care which such meters require, that their fault lies-if fault there be. It will be useless for me to waste the time and patience of my kind listeners, by describing to them the eminently successful |
