Repository: UIHistories Project: UI Foundation Series - Bulletin 2 (1936) [PAGE 7]

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Happenings and Future Plans of Our College of Engineering

T T A K E S a lot of machinery in more ways than one to take care of almost two thousand students of our College of Engineering and keep the faculty out of mischief. Judging by the succession of researches and events given us by Dean M. L. Enger, the college has been, is and will be busy, showing a very profitable year engineerihgly. W e wish we could show the interior of the new testing laboratory at the moment when the big testing machine sits down hard on a cake of cement to show how strong it (the concrete) is and many other things of interest. However, we will let Dean Enger tell about it. Cooperative Investigations. The growth of cooperative investigations during recent years is an interesting development in the work of the Engineering Experiment Station. T o date there have been 76 such contracts of which 22 are now in progress. T h e contributions of the cooperating agencies amount to about $100,000 a year. T h e first cooperative investigation financed by outside agencies w a s the investigation of Stresses in Track, begun in 1914, and carried on continuously since under the direction of Professor A r t h u r N. Talbot. T h e results of the investigation have been published. T h e money has been contributed by the Association of American Railroads, the American Railway Engineering Association, and the American Society of Civil Engineers. T h e investigation of "Warm Air Furnaces and Furnace Heating Systems" w a s begun in 1918, in cooperation with the National W a r m Air Heating and Air Conditioning Association of Columbus, Ohio, under the direction of Professor A. C. Willard. T h e results, published by the Engineering Experiment Station, have recently been republished by the sponsor of the investigation under the title "Gravity W a r m Air Heating—Digest of Research, Engineering Experiment Station, University of Illinois." T h e following titles of other cooperative researches in progress and their cooperating agencies give some idea of the scope of this work.

Cooperative Investigations in Progress Problems in the mining of coal, in cooperation with the State Geological Survey Division. Solubility studies of boiler waters, in cooperation with the Utilities Research Commission, Inc. Stack gases, in cooperation with the Utilities Research Commission, Inc. Methods of eliminating stretching of lead sheaths of high voltage cables, in cooperation with the Utilities Research Commission, Inc. Heating and ventilating, in cooperation with the American Society of Heating and Ventilating Engineers. Rails investigation, in cooperation with the Association of American Railroads and the Rail Manufacturers' Technical Committee. Sound absorption by materials, in cooperation with the United States Gypsum Company. Scale studies, in cooperation with the National Aluminate Corporation. Summer cooling, in cooperation with the American Society of Heating and Ventilating Engineers, the National Warm Air Heating and Air Conditioning Association, and others. Rigid Frame Structures, in cooperation with the Portland Cement Association. Rigid Welded Joints, in cooperation with the Research Committee of the Chicago Section of American Society for Welding Engineers, and others. Strength of Chilled Car Wheels, in cooperation with the Association of Manufacturers of Chilled Car Wheels. Resistance of the Treads of Chilled Car Wheels to Heat Checking, in cooperation with the Association of Manufacturers of Chilled Car Wheels. Monolithic Concrete Walls, in cooperation with the Portland Cement Association.

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Conferences Held or to be Held at the University. A n u m b e r of conferences are being sponsored by the College of Engineering during the second semester which will attract many outof-town visitors and give the student an opportunity to meet and hear prominent practicing engineers in almost every field of engineering. T h e Twenty-third Highway Conference was held Feb. 27 and 28 in cooperation with the State High-

lature. The building will be a two-story addition to the Mining Laboratory and ready for occupancy next September. Professor Jakob Kunz of the Department of Physics, and Professor E. E. Bauer of the Department of Civil Engineering are on leave of absence during the second semester. Before leaving on a trip abroad Dr. Kunz announced an improved form of photo-electric cell which will be further developed on his

E N G I N E E R I N G H A L L , W H I C H H O U S E S T H E E X E C U T I V E O F F I C E S O F T H E COLlege of Engineering as well as many of the departments of the college. The engineering group is at the north end of the campus and consists of about thirteen buildings.

way Department. T h e Fourth Mineral Industries Conference will be held April 24 and 25 in cooperation with the State Geological Survey Division. The First Conference on Air Conditioning* a nontechnical exposition sponsored by the Mechanical Engineering Department will , be held May 4 and 5. The Fourth Glass Conference sponsored by the Department of Ceramic Engineering will be held late in May. T h e Third Coal Short Course sponsored by the Department of Mining and Metallurgical Engineering, will be held early in June. The Electrical Engineering S h o w to be given April 16-18, is put on in alternate years by the students in Electrical Engineering. Excursions are being arranged by railroads and bus lines. The Golden Jubilee Meeting of the Illinois Society of Engineers was held in Urbana J a n u a r y 30, 31 and February 1, 1936. T h e Society was organized by Professors I r a Osborn Baker and Arthur Newell Talbot in February, 1886. A commemorating Bronze Tablet was presented to the University, and will be placed in the Engineering Library. Plans have been completed for a building to house the laboratories of Metallurgical Engineering under an appropriation of $50,000 by the last Legis*Air conditioning is a very live subject. The Engineering Experiment Station has a non-technical pamphlet, Reprint No. 5 on "Essentials of Air Conditioning" by Maurice Fahnestock which will be forwarded to any alumnus on request.

return in 6 months. H e will study in Switzerland and Germany; Professor Bauer has registered in the H a r v a r d Graduate School of Engineering. Professor Kruger of the Physics Department and a group of graduate students and assistants are at this writing almost ready to start work on the disintegration of atoms. They have nearly completed the construction of a cyclotron of design somewhat like that which has been so successful in the hands of its inventor, Professor Lawrence of the University of California. T h e cyclotron, in its essentials, consists of a pair of electrodes like the two halves of a pill box placed between the poles of a powerful electromagnet. By adjusting the frequency of the radio tube oscillators, which supply power to these electrodes, so that the potential reverses every time an ion goes from one half of the pill box to the other, the ion is given an acceleration of 20,000 volts each time it completes a half circle of its path. In this way the ions are accelerated again and again until, in the case of heavy hydrogen ions (deuterons), they obtain a potential of a million volts o r more. Protons get two million volts—all from a 20,000 volt source. The magnet being used for the cyclotron is seven feet long, four feet high, has pole faces sixteen inches in diameter and weighs seven tons. T h e whole unit is to be operated by remote control using a portable control panel to remove the operator from intense sources.

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