Abstract
AT the ordinary meeting of the Institution of Civil Engineers, on Tuesday, December 21, 1886, Mr. Edward Woods, President, in the chair, the paper read was on “The Use and Equipment of Engineering Laboratories,” by Prof. Alex. B. W. Kennedy, M.Inst.C.E. The author believed that it was essential for a young engineer to obtain his practical training, in the ordinary sense of the expression, in a workshop. But the practical training of a workshop was incomplete even on its own ground, and there appeared to be plenty of room for practical teaching such as might fairly fall within the scope of a scientific institution, and which should at the same time supplement and complete workshop experience without overlapping it. In an ordinary pupilage a young engineer did not have much opportunity of studying such things as the physical properties of the iron and steel with which he had to deal, nor the strength of those materials, nor the efficiency of the machines he used, nor the relative economy of the different types of engines, nor the evaporative power of boilers. He required such experience as might help him to determine for himself, or at least to see for himself how other people had determined, all the principal engineering constants, from the tenacity of wrought-iron to the calorific value of coal, or the efficiency of a steam-engine, or the accuracy of an indicator-spring, or the discharge-coefficient of an orifice. He thought that this kind of practical experience could be gained best in an Engineering Laboratory, in connection with some institution where technical instruction was given. He claimed that, in the matter of engineering laboratories, as a branch of technical education, England had really taken the lead, instead of being, as was too often the case in such matters, in the rear.
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On the Use and Equipment of Engineering Laboratories . Nature 35, 235 (1887). https://doi.org/10.1038/035235b0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/035235b0