Correspondence "The Status of the Structural Engineer"

It would seem plain that if existing conditions continue the structural engineer is in for a good time. The number of schemes under contemplation and in connection with which his services will inevitably be requisitioned, is legion, and they apply with magnificent impartiality to our own country, to the Continent, to South America, and to our own Overseas Dominions. Their realisation will involve the expenditure of fabulous sums of money, the source of which might be the subject of painful contemplation, but for the consoling reflexion that it cannot possibly all come out of the pockets of structural engineers themselves, whereas quite a pleasing proportion of it may reasonably be expected to gravitate in that direction. As structural engineers are but human they will respond to the very human desire to make hay while the sun shines-the colder season of their discontent having already been unduly prolonged. In any case a huge sum of money is being earmarked for purposes good, bad, and indifferent, and while in the long run no section of the community can permanently benefit at the expense of another, and the man in the street-that patient milch cow (if the Hibernism be permitted)-may show signs of fatigue stress at the expenditure contemplated, the structural engineer will want his place in the sun, for as long as it shines.

The inherent and peculiar advantages of the tube as a structural element have many times received consideration in print, and, in aeronautical and automobile construction, in the steel furniture industry and in certain other specialised fields, these advantages have already been turned to practical account. The special benefit attaching to the tubular section lies, of course, in a moment of inertia which is of equal magnitude in all directions, enabling the maximum resistance to buckling to be achieved with the lowest possible area of crosssection and hence the minimum weight. Hitherto, it has rarely been found possible, however, to apply the tubular principle to structural steelwork, for rivetting and bolting are highly unsuitable for the jointing of tubes.

As a young English engineer visiting U.S.A. and Canada for the first time I found very much to interest me. On every side one sees progressiveness, efficiency and a readiness to revise building regulations and structural practices to keep abreast of the times. In a very few weeks I became aware that we in England are falling behind our American confreres-not because our engineers or architects are less intelligent or efficient, but seemingly because we are hemmed in by hide bound authorities, regulations and old established practices. In these days of fierce competition in the field of foreign trade, when every extra cost in building finds its way by overhead charges to the cost of our manufactures, it is the duty of us all "ruthlessly to scrap all methods and machinely which do not come up to the most modern standard" -to quote the words of the Prince of Wales, who as a well travelled young man is constantly appealing for a change of ideas in Britain. G.S. Bowers