100,000 turbosuperchargers recover 66 times power generated by Boulder Dam
- Publisher
- Elsevier Science
- Year
- 1944
- Tongue
- English
- Weight
- 210 KB
- Volume
- 238
- Category
- Article
- ISSN
- 0016-0032
No coin nor oath required. For personal study only.
✦ Synopsis
a fluid mass of resin-impregnated fibres. Three research engineers, Doctors Hill, Perry, and Bates, who have been solving problems in plastics for many years and directing their use, are largely concerned with these four new developments at Westinghouse.
A decade from now, Fosterite may be recognized as the greatest advance in electrical insulation for many years. Four years of intensive research by Dr. Hill and his associates created Fosterite along with the steel-like resin. Generally, productive research is a lengthy, painstaking process. For example, research on Micarta has been going on for thirty-five years with steady improvement of the material and extensions of its applications. However, every once in a while, key developments noticeably accelerate progress. The technique of hot forming and the new plastic Micarta 444, especially formulated for this type of molding by Dr. E. R. Perry, are new, war-born developments.
Micarta 444 is so scientifically matched to the process of hot forming that the material retains its unusual properties even after being formed. The process itself produces intricately shaped parts from ordinary sheets of such plastics. This technique is analogous to the pressing of steel. Another technique, analogous to the casting of steel, extends the formability of plastics even further. This process is called preforming, and Dr. A. Allan Bates forsees a tremendous future for this process of forming high-strength parts of intricate shapes.
Fosterite, high-strength resin, hot forming and preforming are typical of recent research developments, some already pressed into use by the war, all of great promise in post-war applications. Designers and engineers will use these materials not as substitutes, but as new materials to make better things for home and industry. These and similar developments are evidence of the better things ahead. R. H. O.