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The Structural Engineer

OUTLINE OF METHODS AND TESTS RESULTS. A comparison is here made of the usual 1: 2: 4 method of proportioning concrete with one in which, no matter what the aggregates may be, the quantity of cement in the finished material remains the same for any given volume. H. C. Johnson

Publish Date – 1 January 1918

The Structural Engineer

Twenty-five years ago the author read a paper before the Society of Architects upon "Timber Piling in Foundations and other Works." The notes then collected and since added to relate chiefly to timber piles, with which the author has had considerable experience, and upon which much scattered information has already been published; but all driven piles, whatever the material, must behave more or less according to the same laws, and the knowledge gained concerning ordinary timber piles will be likely to enable us to discover the laws and regulate the practice of driving and using piles of other material, including reinforced concrete. Henry Adams

Publish Date – 1 January 1918

The Structural Engineer

GENTLEMEN,-I have first to thank you for doing me the honour of electing me as your President. I should like to add that I am conscious of taking office at a time when the work of societies like ours is of national and imperial importance. The European War, horrible and devastating as its effects have been, has produced in this and other countries a wave of energy and enthusiasm for the better study of science and the arts and their application to industry. And this is not to be wondered at. There may be some who say: "Let us concentrate all our thoughts and energies on winning the war, and on nothing else. Science and art are of little importance at the present time." But this is far from being the case. It is true that our first object must be to win the war, and that nothing must stand in the way of achieving it. But we now realize that this is, to a large extent, an engineer’s war, and that science and the arts, industry and invention, play a most conspicuous part in it. In every branch of our Army scientific men have been pressed into the service to help with their knowledge and experience. The same remark applies to the new Government Department which provides the munitions of war, and to the many factories and organizations which are helping it. The chapter of history describing what the engineer, the man of science, and the captain of industry have done during the past two years will, I hope, some day be written. It will certainly be of extraordinary interest. And may I add that the special branch of work fostered by our own Institute will show some very bright achievements. F. E. Wentworth-Sheilds

Publish Date – 1 January 1918

The Structural Engineer

It may well seem to members of this Institute that the problems which confront them today have little enough to do with the matters on which I propose to speak, and indeed the limitations of material under which the old builders worked confined their idelas within much narrower bounds than ours. Bu thte art of construction is a very ancient art, and many of the results of modern science have been anticipated by rule of thumb centuries ago, to be forgotten and rediscovered in different surroundings. A knowledge of such things is essential in dealing with ancient structures, where a mind in sympathy with the methods and ideals of the past is the only sure guide to a right treatment. It will be obvious at first sight that this will limit our choice of expedients; we must rule out treatments which are convenient and advantageous enough in new works, but incompatible with the old. I hasten to add that I do not for a moment suggest that the results of modern science are inapplicable to ancient buildings, or tbat we should use no processes which were not known to their builders. Far from it; our claim to be a generation which values its inheritance of history must rest on our employment of all the means which are at our disposal, for the preservation of that inheritance. Buthey must be used in the right way, and from this spring the limitations which must be observed. An ancient monument, speaking generally, has three precious qualities: its history, its beauty, and its educational value; in attempting to prolong its existence we must not obscure or destroy these qualities. If something must be sacrificed to preserve the rest, the distinction between essentials and non-essentials must be clearly defined, or perbaps it would be more accurate to say that the relative importance of parts which are all by the nature of the case important must be apprehended. The monuments under the charge of the Department of Ancient Monuments and Historic Buildings rahge from earthworks and megalithic monuments to seventeenth century houses, and demand an equally wide range of treatment. They present in infinite variety examples of the ills to which antiquity is subject, but their dilapidatison, when not due to intentional damage, may be said to arise from two main sources, damp and structural weakness; the accumulated shortcomings of nature and man. C. R. Peers

Publish Date – 1 January 1918

The Structural Engineer

The title of my paper may at first sight appear to be rather ambitious, or even dogmatic, as if there were very few wharves, etc., designed rationally, but nothing is farther from my mind. I use the word rational advisedly, and in its extreme literal sense; in other words, the design of reinforced concrete wharves from a common sense, or practical standpoint, based on my own personal experience of about 12 years on this particular class of work. W. Cleaver

Publish Date – 1 January 1918

The Structural Engineer

The Graving Dock known as No. 3, which forms the subject of this paper, was built in 1853 from the design of the late Mr. Alfred Giles, Past President Inst.C.E., and was lengthened to its present dimensions in 1882. It is shown on the plan and section, Figs. 1 and 2. It has an inside length of 520 feet and a width at entrance of 80 feet. The keel blocks are placed at a level of 24 feet below H.W.O.S.T., the blocks themselves being 3ft. 3in. high. The Dock is closed by a pair of wrought iron gates which, when opened, lie back in recesses, and when closed shut against a stone cill which is raised about 2ft. 6in. above the rest of the floor. From the cross-section it will be seen that the walls are 15 feet thick at the base, and that they are reduced by means of three sets of altars to a thickness of 5 feet at the top. The floor has the shape of an inverted arch, and formerly contained five small altars or steps on each side. The walls are constructed of brickwork in lime mortar. The floor consists of the same material for a thickness of 4 feet, and below that of a similar thickness of lime concrete. The altars are capped with Portland roach stone, and the coping of the walls and the hollow quoins, against which the gates rest, are of the same material. The cill is of Bramley Fall sandstone, which was considered to be a very fine building stone at the time the dock was built. It is curious that granite, although much used in the older docks at Southampton, is hardly seen in this particular dry dock. There are no precise records of the nature of the subsoil on which the dock is placed, but there is no doubt that it consists either of a weak sandy clay or of a fine running sand, both of which strata prevail in this neighbourhood. It is probable that fine sand highly charged with water occurs under most of the floor. This conjecture is confirmed by the fact that at the south end of the dock there are two vertical holes through the brickwork of the floor through which water is constantly coming up. R. N. Sinclair

Publish Date – 1 January 1918