Issue 1

If the banks of a ravine appear to be solid and careful investigation has revealed no indication of slipping at any point above, below, or near the proposed location of the bridge the rock bed which is to sustain the thrust from the structure must be drilled and carefully examined its to its nature, strength and depth. If the results are satisfactory the designer can proceed with details to determine the type of structure which should be selected only after a minute analysis of the data obtained. H.E. Brooke-Bradley

Mr. A. N. C. SHELLEY (Ministry of Health), proposing a vote of thanks to Mr. Woods for his interesting and suggestive paper, said he was particularly glad to have been able to pick from it two or three points upon which persons who desired reform of the existing law might concentrate. One of the difficulties in the Ministry of Health was that more or less definite complaints were received-usually less rather than more definite-but it was not easy to relate those complaints to the existing law. He was not suggesting for a moment that the law did not require amendment in many ways; indeed, he was as convinced as anyone that several important amendments could be made. But the difficulty with which any Government was confronted when it had to place proposals before Parliament was two-fold. On the one hand, there was always a certain vis inertice on the part of people who did not want reform; on the other hand, there must be found arguments or reasons for reform with which to convince those who did not care one way or the other. If a Government was not able to convince those who had not thought about the matter, the vis inertice on the part of the people who did not want reform would bring about defeat. For many years he had been hammering away at the architectural and engineering professions to impress upon them the necessity for informing the Ministry, as precisely as possible, of actual difficulties experienced. Mr. Woods had put his finger on one or two of the difficulties, as, for example, the diffusion of the legal requirements which had to be complied with. It was a source of difficulty, when designing a building, working out stresses, and so on, to have to refer to a law which was scattered about in several different places, and there was no reason, in the nature of things, why the law ahould not be brought together. The principal reason against it, he imagined, was that it was not very conformable to the English genius. The problem was easier in Latin systems than in this country, because the law in Latin systems tended to become collected under logical headings, whereas English law did not. Perhaps one thought that in a particular case the law with which one had to comply was collected in one place, but subsequently one found a little of it, affecting the building with which one was concerned-relating to storage of petroleum, structure of theatres, or what not-in a different place. The Ministry of Health had done its best, givcn the law as it stood at the moment, to help to overcome that difficulty, for it had drawn up a Memorandum setting out, at any rate, the headings, indicating what to look for and whcre to look for it. This was Memorandum C. 34+, and it represented a start, at collecting under one cover the headings, or pointers, indicating whcrc to look for one's requirements; his colleagues at the meeting would be glad to have the names of those who would like copies. But Mr. Shelley emphasised that in mentioning this matter he did

SIR,-I have read with interest Mr. Donovan Lee's observations on my article comparing fire-resisting with timber floors, and note that he agrees with my general contention on the advantages of the former in dwelling houses.

THE design of foundations is a matter of increasing importance for two reasons, the first being the growing economic necessity to erect buildings on sites which have hitherto emained undeveloped on account of the poor bearing value of the ground, and the second the present-day tendency to design buildings for smaller unit loads than in the past. So far as the superstructure is concerned this latter tendency is justified, not only by the fact that the loads are in most cases smaller than we have assumed them to be, but also by the advance in methods of design and improvements in the quality of materials. Gower B.R. Pimm

THE following paper is based upon experience which the author has gained with Messrs. L. G. Mouchel & Partners, Ltd., in the design of a large number of statically indeterminate structures, and he has endeavoured to bring out some new methods of presentation. Ernest Cecil Smith

THE manufacture of Portland cement has made such advances during the last thirty years that the modern product bears little resemblance to its forerunners. Also our knowledge of the possibilities that lie in its uses and its behaviour under different conditions have been considerably extended. In this development Standard specifications have played an important part. The first British Standard Specification for Portland cement was published in 1904, and the last in 1931, with five revisions in between these dates. Alan Moncrieff

The author said that before showing the slides and dealing with the paper in general he wished to repair at least one of his crimes of omission. In dealing with the personnel of the job, unfortunately no reference had been made to Mr. W. K. Wallace, M.Inst.C.E., Chief Engineer of the London Midland & Scottish Railway, who was responsible for the preparation of the whole of the scheme when he was engineer of the Northern Counties Cormmittee. Although he left Belfast before the scheme had actually been put under way, most of the smaller bridges had already been designed and the general layout of the viaducts determined. Although he was not directly associated with the construction of the viaducts, his advice was always available and was frequently taken advantage of.

OWING to the publicity that has been to given to the fabrication and erection of the machine-shop at Harmondsworth, the author, observing the rules of the Institution not to submit any but original matter, has been compelled to treat the structure in a general manner as part of an engineering paper. Several papers have been read before the Institution, either in London or in the provinces, and they have dealt sufficiently with the actual depositing of weld metal by the metallic arc process to make redundant any remarks about it in this paper. C. Helsby

A PAPER by the present author under the title of "Modern Constructional Practice in Sewerage and Sewage Disposal” was read before the Institution in 1932, and it may be of interest to illustrate two recent examples of certain of the methods therein described, as applied at Cannock (Staffs.) and Ellesmere Port (Wirral) respectively. A.H.S. Waters