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National Resources Planning Board 



ing metallurgical problems with the American Society 

 for Testing Materials and the American Society of 

 Mechanical Engineers, both of which have research 

 committees on various topics as well as committees for 

 drafting specifications and codes. The American Weld- 

 ing Society has many metallurgical problems. In 

 these, as well as in some other metallurgical societies, 

 experimental research is carried on when the need war- 

 rants, usually as a committee or subcommittee project. 

 The project may take the form of splitting the work 

 into small sections each of which is carried out in the 

 laboratories of the committee members, with subsequent 

 pooling of results, the cash outlay being absorbed by 

 the respective budgets of each cooperator. The work 

 is subject to such delay as the exigencies of the other 

 work of the laboratory may demand. This method is 

 much used on small problems and often as an initial 

 stage in larger ones. 



When the effort required is beyond that which can 

 be slipped in along with the other work of the co- 

 operators, the committee collects funds from those who 

 stand to benefit and who are willing to cooperate finan- 

 cially, and the work is hired done. Sometimes a re- 

 search engineer is hired and facilities for his work 

 secured at the National Bureau of Standards, a uni- 

 versity, or an institute. Rarely is experimental work 

 for the benefit of a group done for pay in the laboratory 

 of one of the member companies, as this is seldom ac- 

 ceptable to the other cooperating firms, though the 

 method has been used. More commonly the project 

 is fanned out to a research foimdation or research 

 institute. 



For example, work thus financed on various phases 

 of problems of metals at high temperature has been 

 simultaneously in progress at Massachusetts Institute 

 of Technology, the engineering research division of the 

 University of Michigan, and at Battelle Memorial 

 Institute for the joint research committee of the A. S. 

 T. M. and A. S. M. E. on Effect of Temperature on the 

 Properties of Metals, while small projects on which 

 work was donated by the laboratories of several manu- 

 facturers were also in hand. 



Utilization of Outside Aid in Research 



The successful conduct of a variety of joint research 

 problems has made it increasingly evident that a firm 

 does not necessarily have to carry on all its research 

 under its own roof. 



Business instability and fear of conditions beyond 

 the control of business, indeed, make firms with mani- 

 fold research problems and limited research staffs hesi- 

 tant to build up large permanent staffs and to install 

 elaborate equipment for their work and more prone to 

 farm out specific problems to outside laboratories. 

 Competently handling such farmed-out problems under 



adequate supervision and with adequate equipment is 

 not easy for the average university professor who does, 

 or should, make instruction his first duty. He lacks 

 the time, and also his laboratory facilities for instruc- 

 tion are not adequate for research that must yield com- 

 mercial results. Hence "engineering experiment sta- 

 tions" or special "research foundations" with full-time 

 or nearly full-time professors to direct research, and 

 with equipment suited to certain restricted lines of re- 

 search, have sprung up in considerable profusion, be- 

 sides the research institutes the sole purpose of which is 

 to provide research facilities for industry. Several of 

 these various types of organizations are specializing in 

 metallurgical research, and these are kept increasingly 

 busy. 



Public Funds Not Available 

 for Metallurgical Research 



There is no mechanism by which the metallurgical 

 industries can get their research done at public expense 

 save to the extent to which they can secm-e cooperation 

 or housing for research associates at Government 

 laboratories such as those of the National Bureau of 

 Standards or the Bureau of Mines. Through transfer 

 funds to the former, the Navy and the National Ad- 

 visory Committee for Aeronautics have had important 

 metallurgical work done on their problems, the results 

 of which have been valuable to industry. The Naval 

 Research Laboratory has done useful work on steel 

 castings. Though these researches have industrial 

 value, that is a byproduct, the primary investigation 

 having been made to secure information directly 

 needed for purely governmental purposes. While 

 these and other Government laboratories are not im- 

 mindful of research on fimdamentals that affect the 

 metallurgical industries, there is no Government 

 research agency to serve metallurgy in any way com- 

 parable to that of the Federal Department of Agricul- 

 ture and the State Agricultm-al Experiment Stations 

 for agriculture. Nor is there any analogy to agricul- 

 tural "extension" work. Through the Department of 

 Science and Industry, England matches pound for 

 pound up to a certain limit, the research funds pro- 

 vided by industry for such laboratories as those of the 

 British Cast Iron Research Association, etc., in which 

 public funds are devoted to metallurgical research 

 topics selected by industry. The scheme is intended 

 to encourage research by and for those who might not 

 otherwise engage in it. 



The endowed research organizations, as a group, do 

 not do much in metallurgy. The projects of the 

 National Research Council have in the past almost 

 invariably been very far afield from anything metal- 

 Im-gical. The Engineering Foimdation has provided 

 funds to start work on several projects of metalliu-gical 



