COMFORT UN INDUSTRY

Evening Star, Issue 20428, 8 March 1930, Page 5

COMFORT UN INDUSTRY

NEW WELFARE DEVICES ADDITIONS TO HOME OFFICE MOSEOM Many of- the exhibits recently added to the Home Office industrial museum show how easily and cheaply working conditions can be improved and output increased (says the London ‘Tunes ). Some of these acquisitions .represent the fruits of research by individual firms. Others, prepared by the museum stall, apply logical principles to industrial requirements. , Most numerous among the latest additions are devices directed to securing good conditions and to saving energy for production by preventing fatigue or discomfort. Two models of ventilating shafts have been constructed, one to show the evils of a shaft which has acute angles, another, . following the same "course, to show how, by streanv lining, a free flow may be assured, and how the diameter of the shait may he gradually reduced after each junction With this goes an apparatus for testing tho efficiency of different types of ventilator in winds from different quarters. Hero employers may satisfy themselves as to the peculiar needs of their own establishments. For purposes of proof and demonstration tho museum lias built an airtight chamlier equipped to produce hot. humid, and stagnant atmospheres, and to show tho relief which movement of the air, without" actual ventilation, can bring. ' The chamber lias three communicating compartments and, a fan. It is heated by panel radiators, anij lias steam jets to reproduce tho humidity of a mill, and even of a laundry and dye bouse. A fairly wide range of atmospheres can thus bo created, and the effect of the movement produced by the big fan is a sufficient contrast to convince the most sceptical. REDUCTION OF NOISE. The reduction of noiso by preventing echo and resonance in an enclosed space is another subject demonstrated. Tho museum lias taken up tho idea of absorbing vibration in layer's of seaweed. The principle lias been applied in the new building of tho Midland Bank, opposite the Mansion House. At the museum an aural test may bo made in two identical and adjacent rooms. In one tho ceiling is quilted with seaweed from N.ova Scotia, and the clatter made by a pneumatic hammer on an iron tank is much less distressing in this room than in tho other.

All these devices, aimed at preventing fatigue and therefore at reducing ill-health, are but a step beyond those which seek to render less unhealthy those trades in which certain diseases rank for workmen’s compensation. One of uieso which has attracted attention is the trade of the stone-cutter, who, using pneumatic chisels, is the mouern stonemason. His work produces far more stone dust, by the acceleration oi tho process, than did the old mason’s, and ho is a frequent victim of silicosis. Tho problem of tho stone dust is now being dealt with, and the museum lias in operation a pneumatic tool fitted with a cowl, into which most of the dust is sucked, on the vacuum cleaner principle, as soon as it is chipped off tho stone. Tho cowl does not obstruct the workman’s view of his job, and is reported to bo efficient, though its design may bo modified in the light of experience.

The extraction of dust from the air in certain industries has become so important that many firms are seeking ideas. One piece of apparatus evolved for their own use by a firm dealing with white lead is reproduced in the museum. Its success under tests has caused it to be adapted for use at the screens of certain collieries. This device, after twice filtering the' air through metal containers, passes it finally through a series of long sausageliko fabric bags, which are saved from clogging by automatic vibration. Tho process gathers nearly all the dust from th.o work benches or screens by suction, and- leaves very little of it in the air, which aftenvards passes back into circulation.

Seats for workers at all sorts of jobs may bo seen. There are tip-up seats for use in brief intervals, adjustable seats, tiny low seats on roller skates used in an artificial silk factory by tho operatives who have to change bobbins near the floor, seats running on a sort of tramway for the convenience of tapestry makers working at big frames, and seats made to measure. They all illustrate tho modern idea that fatigue lowers output. SAFETY DEVICES. Some of tho safety devices are an advance on the old idea of fencing, since they are generally moving guards which push the hand of tho operative into safety. A heavy power press for cutting out metal blanks has one which makes it impossible for tho operative to leave his hand under tho press as it comes down. Two’ platen printing machines that are hand-fed and have been prolific in crushed hands and forearms aro mado safe, m the one case by a moving guard, which raises tho worker’s hand as tho paper swings up to meet the plate, and m the other by a device which sweeps tho hand out of tho way as the heavy plates come together. A safety sausage machine is particularly interesting, and has become necessary by the frequency of accidents and tho extended use of tho mincing machine by butchers and pie-makers. The new machine-has a feeding throat 7in long and only 2iin wide, so that tho hand of the smallest assistant can. no longer follow the meat down to tho revolving knives. Instead it becomes necessary to use a long wooden prodder to complete the feeding process or tq facilitate cleaning.