



Si 
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Figure 37.—CRross-sECTIONAL viEW of the Pygmy 
current meter. (From Water Measurement Manual, 
Bureau of Reclamation, 1953 ed., fig. 68.) 
\ 
of its construction is shown in figure 34. This design 
prevailed for about six years. In September 1937 
Atkinson made another change in the lower bearing 
by reducing its diameter and moving it into a still 
deeper cavity within the hub assembly. ‘This change 
further increased the volume and depth of the air 
pocket. Price’s major objectives in that respect 
were thereby fully reinstated. Meters containing 
that latest change by Atkinson have been identified 
in the Survey as Type-AA Small Price Current 
Meters and by Gurley as their catalog no. 622—AA. 
Except for a subsequent change by the author in 
the materials used for the pivot and lower bearinge— 
stainless steel for the pivot and tungsten carbide for 
the lower bearing—the AA design has continued in 
effect up to the present (1965). A photograph show- 
ing the shaft details in the 622, the A, and the AA 
models is shown in figure 35. The external appear- 
ances (fig. 36) of all three of these models are practically 
identical. The Survey’s policy of making each new 
design change apply as much as possible to the 
preceding models has been followed. Few, if any of 
the 622 and Type-A models remain in the Survey’s 
possession, all of them having been converted to the 
latest Type-AA models. 
As might have been surmised from the foregoing, 
W. & L. E. Gurley was the only firm that manu- 
factured Price meters as long as their rights to Price’s 
patents remained in effect. Not long after those rights 
expired, however, several other instrument makers 
started manufacturing Price meters. Among them 
were the Lallie Manufacturing Company of Denver, 
Colorado; the A. Lietz Company of San Francisco, 

Figure 38.—Type-AA CURRENT METER With a Pygmy 
meter on a carrying bracket in the foreground. 
(Photo taken by author.) 
California; and Hilger and Watts, Ltd., of London, 
England. It was copied even in Russia. Evidence 
of such construction and use of a Russian Price meter 
in Central Asia is contained in the following excerpt 
from Professor Steponas Kolupaila’s Bibliography of 
Hydrometry (1961): 
V. I. Vladychanskii, ““O vertushkakh Praisa” [On Price 
current meters]. Izuvestiia Nauchno-Issledovatel’skogo Insti- 
tuta Gidrotekniki, 8 (1932), pp. 161-164, Leningrad. 
{An imitation of the Price meter made in Russia is 
described and evaluated.] 
Prior to June 1930, the Geological Survey cus- 
tomarily purchased its current meters completely 
assembled from W. & L. E. Gurley. After that it 
became necessary to fill its reeds through contracts 
negotiated annually by the Government’s General 
Services Administration. R. L. Atkinson accordingly 
prepared the complete written specifications required 
for obtaining bids. As subsequent improvements 
developed, these specifications were modified ap- 
propriately by Atkinson’s successors in the Survey. 
As a means for assuring that all parts purchased under 
such contracts would be interchangeable on all 
Survey meters of the corresponding type, Atkinson 
made use of a set of gages for checking each critical 
dimension—a practice that has been followed to 
the present by the Survey. Contracts for individual 
parts or complete meters have since been awarded 
to the following manufacturers: Arline Precision 
Instruments, Inc. and the W. L. Lawrence Company, 
both in Baltimore, Maryland; David White Company, 
Loma Corporation, Modern Screw Products Inc., 
and the Scientific Instruments of Wisconsin, Inc., all 
in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Beginning in 1958, cur- 
rent meters were dropped from the Federal Supply 
Schedule. Since then, Federal agencies have ob- 
tained them through their individual purchasing 
PAPER 70: WILLIAM GUNN PRICE AND THE PRICE CURRENT METERS 67 
