Industrial Research 



323 



esses of making; the lamps and improved tools for 

 carrying on the processes, so that the prices of lamps to 

 the purchasers have been greatly reduced. This price 

 reduction has amounted in round numbers to 60 percent 

 in 20 years. With a consumption of normal size incan- 

 descent lamps (i. e., excluding miniature lamps and 

 special lamps) amountmg to over a million and a half 

 lamps per working day, the annual money-saving to 

 light users resulting from lowered lamp prices and im- 

 proved lamp efficiencies that reduce the consumption of 

 electric power far outweighs the annual cost of the re- 

 search carried on to secure the results, while there is 

 promise of further favorable results from continuation 

 of the researches. 



The average price of electric power used for lighting 

 has gone do\vn dm-ing the past 20 years, and the tend- 

 ency of users has been to increase the amount of light 

 provided. This comes to pass by the use of more lamps 

 and the use of lamps of larger light output. But even 

 thus we have not reached a sound level of general- 

 purpose illumination at night. This objective may not 

 be reached until research has shown how we may pro- 

 duce and use lamps of other and still more efficient 

 types in general service. 



Research has also aided in the production of lamps 

 of special types which are now available for many pur- 

 poses, some of which were previously mentioned, as well 

 as special lamps available for special purposes. Exam- 

 ples of the latter are lamps rich in ultraviolet radiation 

 for use in medical treatment and in sterilization and 

 irradiation operations of various kinds; and lamps rich 

 in the infrared (or heat) radiation, which have multiple 

 uses in industry for heating and drymg and are also of 

 therapeutic value for heating in the mstance of some 

 human diseases. Research in the special types of 

 lamps has also resulted in the production of a variety 

 of lamps for decorative and for advertising purposes. 

 The application of special light sources to stroboscopic, 

 rapid photography is itself contributing to more con- 

 venient study of many industrial processes. All of 

 these are in addition to the special vapor lamps, such 

 as the mercury-vapor and sodium-vapor devices which 

 are widely used in industrial lighting and highway 

 lighting. 



As the results of research are stUl bringing improved 

 economies to the users of lamps as well as improving the 

 adaptabifity of electric lamps to their purposes, still 

 further favorable results of such research may be antici- 

 pated. As yet we have not even approached the limit 

 of efficiency in the conversion of electrical energy into 

 light, and there are great possibilities inherent for re- 

 search here. 



:!21835 — 41 22 



The Generation, Transmission, and 

 General Utilization of Electric Power 



Here again the successful results of today have been 

 arrived at by the joint efforts of mathematicians, 

 physicists, chemists, metallurgists, and engineers. Since 

 the period some decades ago when electric-power deliv- 

 ery became an essential service in American commu- 

 nities, industrial research has been continuously applied 

 in the effort to discover new processes and to improve 

 the old so that the delivery of power might be made 

 more uniform and reliable and the cost be reduced so 

 that the price charged to the consumers could be ac- 

 cordingly reduced and the availability of the electricity 

 increased. The effort has been rewarded by an extraor- 

 dinary expansion in the use of electric power in this 

 country. 



Research has been intensive in this field and also of 

 wide range, even though we omit from consideration the 

 prime movers associated with power generation, which 

 of themselves are, in their effectiveness, the outcome of 

 much research.' 



Electric-power research has extended from aspects 

 concerned with the metallm'gy of the steel cores of 

 electrical machinery (to assure a suitable combination 

 of magnetic and electrical qualities) to such matters as 

 the protection of macliinery and circuits from damaging 

 attacks which may be caused by lightning — a very wide 

 field. It has included both alternating-current prob- 

 lems and dii-ect-current problems, and the conversion 

 of one character of currents into the other; the cooling 

 of electrical machinery by air, water, and hydrogen; 

 the elasticity, plasticity, and creep of metals; the 

 qualities of electrical insulating materials; the control 

 and protection of electric circuits; electric arcs in both 

 their useful and their destructive aspects; methods of 

 testing machines and circuits; improvements for small 

 motors; construction of silent fans; electrostatic air 

 cleaning; mduction heating; incremental distribution 

 of loads between machines and between circuits; travel- 

 ing waves; and many other features for which improve- 

 ments obviously have been needed or regarding which 

 it has appeared that research might disclose serviceable 

 residts. In some instances, however, research is 

 undertaken because a particular field has not previously 

 had exacting research attention and there appears 

 reasonable promise of useful fruit to be gathered by 

 such attention. 



There arc many manucfaturers of electrical machin- 

 ery and circuit equipment in this country, several of 



' The outcomes of researches in the theoretical thermodynamics, the properties of 

 steam at high pressures and superheated temperatures, the design and construction 

 of large steam turbines and of high-pressure boilers have greatly advanced the art of 

 electric-power generation from fuels. 



