THE soldier of today is much better off than his comrade of pre-war days, for there now exists in the Army the means to train warrant officers, N.C.O.'S and men in building, engineering and agriculture to prepare them for civil employment on discharge from the service. Lieut. B.H.D. Hurst
Dear Sir,-I shall be glad if any of your readers with a large experience in the erection of steel sheds and gantries will say if it is the correct procedure, and in accordance with the principles of Structural (Mechanical) Engineering, to grout in the foundations of stanchions or columns after the gantry girders are lifted and the gantry line is trued?
In the preceding chapters of this series I have attempted to describe the achievements of some of the greatest British engineers. I have confined myself to famous names, and the men whose works are here analysed are all of the past. Hugh Myddelton belonged to the 16th and 17th centuries, Smeaton and Brindley to the 18th, while the two Rennies and Telford and Brunel carry us to the 19th, which latter century also gave us Robert Stephenson, Sir John Fowler, and Sir John Wolfe Barry. These are the old engineers, and we may ask what is their message to practitioners of to-day? In order to answer this question it may be advantageous to take a general survey of the lives and work of these redoubtable men who perhaps did more than any others to create the profession of engineering in this country. A few words may here be interpolated in defence of the order in which the engineers were presented in these pages. It was considered that a strictly chronological arrangement would have been inappropriate, inasmuch as the object of this series was not in the first instance to give an historical account of developments in engineering, but rather to establish the range and cultural significance of this particular activity. Consequently some of the most famous names of all were introduced at the beginning, so that the prestige of engineering and the genius of its foremost practitioners should immediately be recognised, while the later chapters serve to illustrate the extraordinary range of both the subject of engineering and of the talent which is devoted to its exposition. A. Trystan Edwards
Members of the Institution will learn with regret of the death of Mr. C. F. Chettle., (Member), a Director of Messrs. Archibald D. Dawnay & Sons, Ltd. Mr. Chettle entered the services of the Company 30 years ago after leaving Brdingly College. He had for many years taken an active part in the management of the Compamy's affairs, and was a prominent Member of the Institution of Structural Engineers.
I had tea with Charles Dickens at Wright’s Coffee House, Charing Cross, about 1870. I remember Sir Benjamin Baker in his early days when he was working as a draughtsman in Sir John Fowler’s office. He was well appreciated at that time, as one day he was not looking well and Sir John (then Mr. Fowler) said to him, “ Here’s a cheque for £50 take a month’s holiday with it.” About 1882 Sir John Lubbock (afterwards Lord Avebury) showed me over his collection of ants and flint implements, and I had tea with his family. I went from there to see Charles Darwin, who lived near, but as he was at dinner I would not disturb him; I am a great admirer of his books and his patient investigations. I met Prof. J. Macquorn Rankine at the first Conversazione of the Institution of Civil Engineers that I attended. Professor Henry Adams
IN our issue of October we published a description of the two beet sugar factories about to commence operations at Ipswich and Ely. Below we give particulars of a third which has just been erected at Kidderminster for the West Midland Sugar Co., Ltd., of which Lord Weir, Lord Invernairn, J.B. Talbot Crosbie, Esq., Cecil Brinton, Esq., and Mr. Westwood are the directors. Constructed and equipped by Messrs. Duncnn Stewart and Co., Ltd., London Road Ironworks, Glasgow, the new factory is a steel-framed structure, the contract for the supply and erection of the steel framework having been entrusted to Messrs. Braithwaite and Co. (Engineers), Ltd., Crown Bridge Works, West Bromwich. This factory is the second steel-framed beet sugar factory of all-British design and equipment to be erected in Great Britain or the Continent, and is also the second establishment on the programme of the corporation, which also includes four other factories to be built in the near future.
This Society was founded in 1912 by The Royal Institute of British Architects, the Surveyors’ Institution and the Architectural Association for the benefit of employees of architects, surveyors, civil and structural engineers and allied professions, who are in receipt of sularies not exceeding £250 per annum, and who consequently come within the scope of the National Health Insurance Act.
Of great interest to structural engineering is the sand lime (calcium silicate) process for the manufacture of bricks, building blocks, tiles, and slabs. This has a number of important advantages, including the fact that no skilled labour is required and the products have a much greater resistance to crushing strain than the burnt clay brick, the edges are all mathen1atically straight and even without bulging, warping or twisting, as in the case of ordinary bricks, and a wide range of convenient, sizes and shapes can be made to order without difficulty. Until quite recently the sand lime process has been almost completely neglected in Great Britain, and accordingly therefore considerable interest attaches to the fact that a fine new sand lime brick plant was started some time ago at Littlehampton in Sussex by the Arun Brick Co., Ltd. This is on the latest high pressure principle, with a capacity of 110,000 to 120,000 bricks per week, and a brief description will not be without interest, especially in view of the continued scarcity and high price of burnt clay bricks and the fact that the use of this method is increasing rapidly on the Continent and in the United States and Canada, the total world production of sand lime bricks being now over 2,500,000,000 per annum. It will be remembered that
Every age brings its problems,; but the inevitable march of civilisation presents new phases to problems of great antiquity. Some problems of the present age are quite new, born of the conditions and requirements of modern times. Sir Charles T. Ruthen