Repository: UIHistories Project: Board of Trustees Minutes - 1890 [PAGE 199]

EXTRACTED TEXT FROM PAGE:

202

UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS.

T o facilitate practice in surveying, an area has been specially prepared in which the difficulties of plane surveying are presented t o the beginner as he is able t o meet them, and where he is t a u g h t practical methods of overcoming them. All possible distances, directions, areas, and elevations are accurately k n o w n ; hence the instructor knows beforehand the precise res u l t which the student should obtain. Not a single problem or -exercise is given in which there is wanting an absolute check upon the accuracy of the work. This is an incentive t o t h e student and enables t h e teacher t o show him the degree of accuracy attained and also t o point o u t errors. For the Lecture Room.—The school h a s numerous models for i l l u s t r a t i n g its specialties, including models of bridges, roofs, joints, and connections; a large collection of drawings, p h o t o g r a p h s , and photo-lithographs of bridges, roofs, and engineering structures, numerous railway maps, profiles, etc.; m a p s of government surveys, and plans and specifications. I t h a s access t o a complete set of lithographs of the lectures and drawings used in the government polytechnic schools of France. The ind u s t r i a l museum contains a large collection of building materials, of wood, brick, stone, and iron. The testing l a b o r a t o r y h a s a machine with a capacity of a hundred t h o u s a n d pounds for tension, compression, or bending; also a cement-testing machine. The library is well supplied with the best and latest periodicals and books upon engineering subjects, t o which t h e students h a v e full access.

PEACTICE.

I n t h e fall term of t h e second year the class solves numerous problems in distances, areas, etc., using t h e chain, compass, a n d p l a n e table. During t h e winter t e r m t h e students have practice wTith all the engineering instruments and solve problems with t h e t r a n s i t , stadia, level, and sextant. In the spring t e r m t h e class makes a topographical survey of a locality, using t h e s t a d i a and plane table as in t h e United States surveys. In the fall term of the third year the class executes a project in railroad engineering, which consists of preliminary surveys, location, s t a k i n g out, drawings, computation of e a r t h work, etc. The preliminary survey consists in an examination of t h e locality, and in running t a n g e n t lines, with leveling and t o p o graphical sketching. The location consists in running the line over the r o u t e decided upon, with all the necessary measurements and calculations for establishing the grade, setting slope stakes, etc. The drawings include alignment, profile, etc. In the fall of the fourth year the student h a s practice with t h e alt-azimuth instrument in reading horizontal and vertical angles, a n d in determining l a t i t u d e ; with the astronomical t r a n s i t in finding time ; with the sextant in getting time and latitude ; with the aneroid and mercurial barometers in measuring heights, .and with the precise level in leveling.