368 



SCIENCE 



[Vol. LV, No. 1423 



digest of replies to these questionnaires is ex- 

 pected to be available shortly. 



Many firms and universities have offered to 

 cooperate in the research work. Every en- 

 deavor will be made to maintain their interest 

 and to assign problems to those universities 

 and industrial laboratories offering to co- 

 operate; due regard being given to the facili- 

 ties and talent available. A list of research 

 subjects has been compiled, which is given in 

 part below : 



1. Eecovery of used molding sand through re- 

 storing bond to the sand by subjecting it to con- 

 tact with water vapor under high pressure. 



2. The effects of additions of certain chemical 

 reagents upon the physical properties of clays 

 and clayey materials, sudi as molding sand. 



3. Effects of water content on the bond and 

 permeability of a molding sand. 



i. Effects of different water per cents, in mold- 

 ing sand on the milling and drilling speeds of 

 light gray iron castings. 



5. Research on fusion quality of facings (func- 

 tion of "peeler"). 



6. Tests of various kinds of clays for restoring 

 bond to molding sand. 



7. Comparison of the life of different molding 



8. Effects on plasticity of bond in molding 

 sand and reduction of water content when using 

 oil. 



9. Effects of wet and dry storing of sand on 

 bonding quality. 



The American Steel Foundries Company has 

 permitted a representative of the committee to 

 make a digest of the sand reclamation work 

 carried on by the engineering staff' of the 

 A. S. F. and has assisted in the preparation of 

 this digest. Because of the scarcity of steel 

 molding sand of the best quality and the prob- 

 lems arising from having to dispose of large 

 quantities of refuse sand, this company has 

 carried out an extensive investigation of meth- 

 ods of reclaiming the good material which is 

 usually lost, whenever the so-called refuse sand 

 is thrown away. After experimenting along 

 different lines and thoroughly going over meth- 

 ods employed in other plants, a process of 

 reclaiming old sand called "centrifugal scrub- 

 bing" was developed. 



After establishing the principle of this 

 method, equipment was designed which permits 

 a recovery of about 70 per cent, of refuse sand. 

 Cost figures for 1921 show that a ton of re- 

 claimed sand costs about $1 per ton against 

 the cost of new sand, at the plant, of $2.65 to 

 $3.85 a ton. The process involves cleaning the 

 sand grains of adhering fused material, then 

 separating by air currents the good sand from 

 the bad material. Included in the 30 per cent, 

 loss is some good bonding material which, be- 

 cause of its similarity to bad material, can not 

 be economically separated. 



The report covers the theory of sand reclaim- 

 ing, centrifugal air scrubbing process, cost of 

 reclaiming sand by the latter process, and a 

 description of the proposed sand reclaiming 

 unit. 



THE BRITISH INDUSTRIAL FATIGUE RE- 

 SEARCH BOARD 



The second annual report of the Industrial 

 Fatigue Research Board has recently been 

 issued. As reported in the British Medical 

 Journal it contains "a comprehensive summary 

 of the chief i-esults obtained by the board since 

 its inception some three years ago. These re- 

 sults have been published in a series of sixteen 

 reports, which represent the output of the 

 board's investigatoi-s over a period of about 

 two years, for there is necessarily a consider- 

 able delay before the results of the inquiries 

 reach the stage when they are ready for pub- 

 lication. If any critic had doubts as to the 

 value of the board's work, and the importance 

 of its further development on the lines laid 

 down in this report, we think that such doubts 

 would speedily be laid to rest by an impartial 

 study of its pages. They contain a solid body 

 of information which is of direct value to em- 

 ployers of labor, and to welfare workers and 

 factory inspectors; the practical application of 

 this information to the remedy of adverse 

 industrial conditions would produce a very real 

 improvement in the health and efficiency of the 

 workers. In the analysis of published work 

 with which the report opens the various tests 

 of efficiency and fatigue employed are brieflj' 

 described, and then a more detailed account is 

 given of the results obtained in various indus- 



