Rough and Tumble Engineering | Page 6

because the engineer was as near the separator as he was to the engine when a root went into the cylinder. Stay with your engine, and if anything goes wrong at the separator, you are ready to stop and stop quickly, and if you are signalled to start you are ready to start at once You are therefore making time for your employer or for yourself and to make time while running a threshing outfit, means to make money. There are engineers running engines today who waste time enough every day to pay their wages.
There is one thing that may be a little difficult to learn, and that is to let your engine alone when it is all right. I once gave a young fellow a recommendation to a farmer who wanted an engineer, and afterward noticed that when I happened around he immediately picked up a wrench and commenced to loosen up first one thing and then another. If that engineer ever loses that recommendation he will be out of a job, if his getting one depends on my giving him another. I wish to say to the learner that that is not the way to run an engine. Whenever I happen to go around an engine, (and I never lose an opportunity) and see an engineer watching his engine, (now don't understand me to mean standing and gazing at it,) I conclude that he knows his business. What I mean by watching an engine is, every few minutes let your eye wander over the engine and you will be surprised to see how quickly you will detect anything out of place. So when I see an engineer watching his engine closely while running, I am most certain to see another commendable feature in a good engineer, and that is, when he stops his engine he will pick up a greasy rag and go over his engine carefully, wiping every working part, watching or looking carefully at every point that he touches. If a nut is working loose he finds it, if a bearing is hot he finds it. If any part of his engine has been cutting, he finds it. He picked up, a greasy rag instead of a wrench, for the engineer that understands his business and attends to it never picks up a wrench unless he has something to do with it. The good engineer took a greasy rag and while he was using it to clean his engine, he was at the same time carefully examining every part. His main object was to see that everything was all right. If he had found a nut loose or any part out of place, then he would have taken his wrench, for he had use for it.
Now what a contrast there is between this engineer and a poor one, and unfortunately there are hundreds of poor engineers running portable and traction engines. You will find a poor engineer very willing to talk. This is bad habit number one. He cannot talk and have his mind on his work. Beginners must not forget this. When I tell you how to fire an engine you will understand how important it is, The poor engineer is very apt to ask an outsider to stay at his engine while he goes to the separator to talk. This is bad habit number two. Even if the outsider is a good engineer, he does not know whether the pump is throwing more water than is being used or whether it is throwing less. He can only ascertain this by watching the column of water in the glass, and he hardly knows whether to throw in fuel or not. He don't want the steam to go down and he don't know at what pressure the pop valve will blow off. There may be a box or journal that has been giving the engineer trouble and the outsider knows nothing about it. There are a dozen other good reasons why bad habit number two is very bad.
If you will watch the poor engineer when he stops his engine, he will, if he does anything, pick up a wrench, go around to the wrist pin, strike the key a little crack, draw a nut or peck away at something else, and can't see anything for grease and dirt. When he starts up, ten to one the wrist pin heats and he stops and loosens it up and then it knocks. Now if he had picked up a rag instead of a wrench, he would not have hit that key but he would have run his hand over it and if he had found it all right, he would have let it alone, and would have gone over the balance of the engine and when he started