The Work of the National Physical Laboratory.
Page 18
If you've noticed an error in this article please click here to report it so we can fix it.
Pr HE 25th anniversary of the foundation of the National Physical Laboratory was made the opportunity for the annual inspection by the chairman of the Board of the Laboratory, Sir Charles Sherrington, 0.M., President of the Royal Society, and the occasion was celebrated by the opening of the fine new entrance-gates and roadways to the grounds in which the Laboratory buildings stand.
A number of important people in science, commerce and industry were invited to meet the chairman of the board, Sir Arthur Schuster, F.R.S., and the director, Sir Joseph E. Petavel, K.B.E. The visitors, to the number of many hundreds, were conducted over the Laboratory and the work in the various departments was very clearly explained by those having charge of the numerous tests and experiments which are being carried out. c34 In the engineering department there were items of interest to those connected with the motor industry in the new 100 h.p. variable-speed electrical dynamometer. On this machine an endurance test was being made of a new form of propeller-shaft coupling—one which has already been described in the columns of this journal. Endurance tests of big-end bearings were being carried out on another machine, whillt vet a further testing machine was conducting endurance tests on laminated springs. Two shapes of spring leaf formed the subject of these experiments, and of the specimens laid out for examination one had had the second leaf from the bottom broken after about 410,000 reversals in the testing machine, but the particular spring which was under test in the machine had already withstood over one million reversals.