330 



National Resources Planning Board 



indicates the wide variety that will turn up, running all 

 the way from a new vehicle for the exploration of marsh 

 territory otherwise impenetrable to the development of 

 accurate instruments for investigating oil mider condi- 

 tions at the bottom of a well. In general, we wUl tackle 

 any mechanical, electrical, or civil engineering problem 

 that is handed to us and any similar problems that may 

 be passed along to us by other groups, particularly the 

 chemical group. The effect of machines is so great on 

 the perfonnance of fuels and lubricants that in all cases 

 the mechanical engineer must have a hand in the design 

 of the test apparatus, so as to standardize mechanical 

 effects, before the chemist can determine any tiling much 

 about the beha^'ior of a lubricant as such, the mechan- 

 ical effects being very much greater in magnitude than 

 the total differences between lubricants." 



These, and other statements in the letters received, 

 emphasize strikingly the futility of attempting to 

 classify industrial research workers according to the 

 disciphnes in wliich they were originally trained. There 

 is far more difference between a research man, a produc- 

 tion man, and a salesman than there is between a 

 mechanical engineer, a chemical engineer, a physicist 

 and a chemist. In Dr. Hirshfeld's words, "For real 

 success (in industrial research) a very thorough ground- 

 ing in many different and extensive fields of knowledge 

 is required." Similarly an executive in a public utility 

 writes, "E.xcept as a narrow specialist, the mechanical 

 engineer, hke the electrical engineer, the physicist, the 

 chemist, the metallurgist, loses his identity in organized 

 research. Research is effective only to the extent that 

 it brings to bear on its problems the help of all branches 

 of science that may contribute." And an instrument 

 maker writes: "Our field of work is so diversified, com- 



FicuRB 98. — Et|uipineiit for liivcsiigatiori of lloat. ])ist,riliution 

 in a Conventional Railway Journal Box Assembly, Railway 

 Service and Supply Corporation, Indianapolis, Indiana 



prising measuring problems in electricity, magnetism, 

 hght, heat, ra(Uant energy, sound and mechanical phe- 

 nomena, that whether the engineer is nominally an 

 electrical or a mechanical engineer, he becomes, after a 

 training period, actually an applied physicist in a broad 

 sense." 



No attempt will therefore be made to define a "me- 

 chanical engineer" for the purposes of tliis report. Any- 

 one working in a field commonly thought of as within 

 the wide range of mechanical-engineering acti\'ities 

 deserves attention; so also does anyone who thinks of 

 liimself as a mechanical engineer but who works in some 

 apparently remote and unrelated field, for these men 

 may be showing the way to new research opportunities 

 of great potential value to industry and of equally great 

 interest to adventurous engineers looking for careers. 



This uncritical attitude with respect to exact defini- 

 tions is encouraged by a statement from a large auto- 

 mobile maker to the effect that "mechanical engineering 

 enters into every phase of our work. It is necessary to 

 have mechanical engineers in our metallurgy, physics, 

 and chemistry departments, in addition to the straight 

 mechanical engineering departments that handle prob- 

 lems in appUed mechanics, engine development, and 

 many related subjects." 



Process Research 



Since this report is concerned with industrial research, 

 the major field of activity from which its material must 

 necessarily be drawn is manufacturing or production, 

 and it is no sm-prise to find more or less formally organ- 

 ized fact-finding penneating every phase of produc- 

 tive activity. To quote Dr. Hirshfeld again it is evi- 

 dent that "almost every department can profit from 

 organized fact-finding studies." 



A rough but useful classification of the various phases 

 of production is one that distinguishes between process 

 and product, and the material to be presented in the 

 major part of this report will be arranged on the basis 

 of this distinction. 



Inspection of Raw Materials 



One of the earhest forms in wliich what were often 

 called "research laboratories" appeared in industry 

 was a department set up for the testing of materials 

 purchased for use in manufacture. Such procedures 

 have been common in industry for many years, but it 

 is customary nowadays to speak of them scornfully, if 

 at all, in any report on "research." It is true that 

 I'outine testing is very far indeed from research. Never- 

 theless, the inspection of raw materials should not be 

 ignored in any attempt to describe comprehensively 

 the research function in industry, for two reasons. 



In the first place, groups strictly limited to raw-ma- 

 terials testing may, and often do, attack and solve 



