of the best practice for different types of bridges that there is no great difficulty in realizing the true intent of the design in the study of the structure that must be made in the shop drawing room. It would seem to be wise economy on the part of the designing engineer to take full advantage of these facts.

"For full-punched work,* with splices in chords reamed to fit, it is important that the design should provide for the next larger sized rivet in the reamed splices. This saves in the shop one handling of all the main parts, because one size of punched holes will answer for both reamed and unreamed holes. If, for instance, 7/8" rivets are being generally used, and allowance is not made in the design for larger punching than 15/16", it is necessary to punch 15/16" holes in the body of the member and rehandle all the long main parts in order to punch a smaller-sized hole (say 13/16" diameter) at the ends where the splice is to be reamed for fit. If allowance is made in the design for 1 1/16" holes, the punching throughout will be 15/16" and the splices will then be reamed out to 1 1/16", thus saving the extra handling at the punch.

"In heavy, reamed girder-work where several cover plates, side plates, and heavy flange-angles are used, the size of the sub-punched holes should be not less than 13/16" diameter. It is difficult and expensive to fit up such work where, because of the size of sub-punched holes, smaller fitting-up bolts are necessary. This is because of the great difficulty in properly pulling together such heavy parts and so many of them with 5/8" fitting-up bolts. For work not properly brought together in fitting, the riveting is expensive and apt to be imperfect.

"It almost goes without saying that Forge and Machine Shop work should be kept at a minimum. Bending of long pieces is particularly undesirable, because, when a long angle, for instance, is to be bent, the operation of heating and bending disorganizes and interferes with all the adjacent operations in the shop. Making a bend at each end of a long angle, channel, or beam is not only quite expensive, but next to impossible to do, because of the extreme difficulty in maintaining the correct measurement between bends.

"Curving ends of girders is a considerable item of extra shop expense. It adds to the cost of drawings, templets, laying out, punching, assembling, and riveting, in addition to the extra cost of bending the end angles. In fact, it is doubtful if the aesthetic value is enhanced at all in proportion to the increased price which the buyer must pay. However, where it is decided to use 'round ends,' the exact radius of the curve should be left to the shop detailer, so that standard bending forms may be used.

"Staggered riveting invites shop errors and slows down the work. Preference should be given to rivets placed opposite or in single rows, where the necessities of design do not require that they be staggered. The different members  of  a  span  should  be  designed, as far as possible, to allow

* The author is opposed, on general principles, to punching any rivet holes full size.