Two share inventors’ award first prize

Press, 15 December 1983, Page 33

Two share inventors’ award first prize

Two inventors — an electronic probe for grading meat, and a motorcycle with a lightweight plastic frame — tied for first prize in the seventh U.D.C. inventors award yesterday. The names of the winners, Mr Brian Hennessey, of Auckland, and Mr Steven Roberts, of Wanganui, were announced by the Minister of Science and Technology (Mr Shearer), at a luncheon at Wellington’s Michael Fowler Centre. The chairman of U.D.C. Finance, Mr P. G. Gilbert, increased the $5OOO first prize to $6OOO, and presented each with a U.D.C. secured debenture .certificate for $3OOO. The electronic probe took ten years to develop, and enables an operator to grade as many as 1200 carcases an hour. It instantly tells how much fat or meat there is on the carcase, what grade the meat is, and whether it will be rough, tough, or tender. Already Sweden has officially adopted the Hennessey grading system, and Norway, Russia, France, Finland, and Australia have expressed positive interest. The Roberts motorcycle

has a lightweight plastic frame replacing the conventional metal frame, and has been developed principally for racing. The reinforced plastic is moulded to incorporate wheel suspensions specially designed to allow the lighter frame to take up the loading. Advantages of the new construction are a low centre of gravity, and improved power-to-weight ratio. Mr Gilbert said that the tie for the award indicated the high standard of the finalists. “The high standard of the inventions we see displayed here today is certainly worthy of the traditions of this award, which has become the most coveted prize for New Zealand inventors,” he said. The other four finalists were the D.S.I.R. and the Apple and Pear Marketing Board, with a plant for fumigating fruit, Mr Geoffrey Laurent, of Cambridge, with his plastic tie-on hoof protectors for stock, Mr Joseph Smith, of Auckland, with his curved-track drawing board, and Mr Mark Titchener, of Auckland, with his self-righting computer code.