Reynolds v. General Elec. Co.

Citation141 F. 551
Decision Date15 November 1905
Docket Number2,261-- 2,264.
PartiesREYNOLDS et al. v. GENERAL ELECTRIC CO. GENERAL ELECTRIC CO. v. REYNOLDS ET AL. REVENUE TUNNEL MINES CO. v. GENERAL ELECTRIC CO. GENERAL ELECTRIC CO. v. REVENUE TUNNEL MINES OC.
CourtUnited States Courts of Appeals. United States Court of Appeals (8th Circuit)

(Syllabus by the Court.)

An express warranty of one of the qualities of a machine or article excludes implied warranties of other qualities of the article of a similar nature.

The General Electric Company, a corporation, brought two actions in the Circuit Court to enforce its claim for a balance of account of $10,000, which was due to it for machinery which it had sold and delivered to the Revenue Tunnel Mines Company, another corporation. One of these actions was against the mines company for the balance of the account. The other was against Albert E. Reynolds and others, who were directors of the mines company, and was founded upon the indebtedness of the latter company, and upon the fact that it had failed to file its annual report within 60 days after the 1st day of January in the years 1902 and 1903, and had thereby charged its directors with liability for its debts under Sess. Laws Colo. 1901, p. 121, c. 52, Sec. 11. The two actions were tried together. The same defenses were interposed in each. They were: (1) That the plaintiff in the year 1902 warranted a pump which it sold to the mines company to have a capacity of 300 gallons per minute against a head of 350 feet; and (2) that the plaintiff warranted this pump to be reasonably fit and proper for the use of pumping water in the shaft of a mine, and it was so defective that it was unsuitable for this purpose. These were the material facts established at the trial: The plaintiff was a manufacturer of electrical machinery, and it was a dealer in pumps, but it did not manufacture them. The mines company inquired of the plaintiff for the cost of an electric pump to force 300 gallons of water per minute to a height of 350 feet, with a direct current of 800 volts. The machinery requisite for this purpose consisted of a pump, an electric motor to drive it and a starting rheostat. The plaintiff was the manufacturer of electric motors, but it was necessary to have the pump constructed by a builder of pumps. It wrote to the mines company that it assumed that it would require a standard stationary pump, and that it was taking the matter up with the pump builders.

A few days later it quoted prices on its motor and rheostat, (1) with a Knowles horizontal triplex 8x8 single acting power pump, (2) with a Knowles vertical triplex power pump, and (3) with a Worthington vertical triplex 8x2 power pump, and the mines company selected the Worthington pump. Thereupon the plaintiff agreed to furnish a Worthington pump 'having a capacity of 300 gallons per minute against a head of 350 feet,' and one of its motors with a starting rheostat to drive the pump. It promised to ship the motor to the works of the Worthington company, and to deliver the outfit, after testing it, fee on board the cars at that place. No complaint was ever made of the motor or rheostat. The International Steam Pump Company owned the Worthington works and the Deane works. All the Worthington pumps were manufactured at the Deane works at that time, and the pump in question was made there from Worthington patterns. The dimensions and cubical capacity of the pump were sufficient to receive and discharge 300 gallons of water per minute against a head of 350 feet, and this task was accomplished by means of it for two or three days at a time. But through some defect of materials, of workmanship, or of installment, its cylinders repeatedly leaked and broke, it became useless while attempts were being made to replace them and to repair it in other ways, and the maine became flooded before it was finally repaired by the use of steel cylinders so that it would perform the work the mines company desired of it. The latter company and the directors offered to prove, as damages sustained by the company from the alleged breach of the warranties, the increased cost of the power which the mines company had used during the repair of the pump, the salaries paid to its general and executive officers while the pump was disabled, the cost of removing the water from the shaft after it was flooded, and its loss from its interruption of its general mining operations while it was impossible to use the pump, but the court refused to allow them to do so, and they have sued out writs of error to review this and other rulings which present similar questions relative to the measure of damages. These writs present cases numbered 2,261 and 2,263.

The plaintiff requested the court to instruct the jury that the mines company was not entitled to maintain its counterclaim, and that they should return a verdict against it for $10,000 and interest. The court refused this request, instructed the jury that 'express warranty means that the warranty is expressed in the contract, and implied warranty means that it is not expressed, but is inferred or implied by the law upon certain facts, and in either event the warranty is in this case that the machinery was made of reasonably suitable materials, that it could be operated for the usual lifetime of such machinery, that it would last whatever the usual life of such machinery would be-- such a period of months or years, as the case might be'; and submitted the questions whether or not there was a breach of this covenant, and, if so, the amount of the damages. The plaintiff specifies this ruling as error, and cases numbered 2,262 and 2,264 are presented by its writs of error. There was a verdict and judgment in each case for $8,123.26.

Gerald Hughes (Charles J. Hughes, Jr., on the brief), for Revenue Tunnel Mines Co. and Albert E. Reynolds and others.

Henry F. May (John S. Macbeth and John F. Truesdell, on the brief), for General Electric Co.

Before SANBORN, Circuit Judge, and PHILIPS and CARLAND, District Judges.

SANBORN Circuit Judge, after stating the case as above, .

If the plaintiff below was entitled to a directed verdict because it was guilty of no breach of any warranty, as its counsel assert, the alleged errors in the refusals of the court to receive evidence, and to submit instructions relative to the amount of damages of which the defendants complain, were not prejudicial, and will require no consideration.

The contention of the plaintiff will therefore first be considered. The only express warranty, which was in reality a condition and not a warranty, because the contract was executory, was that the pump should be a Worthington pump, and should have 'a capacity of 300 gallons per minute against a head of 350 feet. ' The pump was a Worthington pump. It was made from Worthington patterns by the owner of the Worthington plant at the Deane works, where all Worthington pumps were then manufactured. It was of sufficient size, and it included ample space for 300 gallons per minute against a head of 350 feet, and that quantity was actually thrown through it for two or three days at a time before it was finally repaired. But either on account of latent defects in materials, in construction or in installation, parts of it gave way from time to time, so that it could not be used continuously until it was finally repaired by the use of steel cylinders. These facts did not constitute the breach of the express warranty alleged in the answer. That breach was that the pump never at any time had a capacity to exceed 120 gallons per minute against a head of 350 feet, and that after an attempt to increase its capacity above that amount some of the parts broke and disabled it until they were replaced.

It is now contended, however, that the warranty was that the pump 'could be operated for the usual lifetime of such machinery, and that it would last whatever the usual lifetime of such machinery would be,' and that, as it did not do so, the contract was broken. In other words, the claim is that the description of capacity was a warranty of performance, efficiency, and endurance. Counsel declare that they rely upon McGowan v. American Pressed Tan Bark Co., 121 U.S. 575, 602, 604, 7 Sup.Ct. 1315, 30 L.Ed 1027, to support this position. In that case the defendants, who were manufacturers, made a written agreement to construct for the plaintiff a machine for the purpose of pressing bark. They described the various parts of the machine in the contract and expressly agreed (1) that the entire machine should be constructed 'in a workmanlike manner and of first-class material'; (2) that it should 'have a sufficient capacity to do the requisite work'; (3) that it could be 'used up to fifteen hundred tons pressure'; and (4) that they guarantied 'the whole.' The Supreme...

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