INVENTIONS SAVE THOUSANDS

Greymouth Evening Star, 11 August 1936, Page 3

INVENTIONS SAVE THOUSANDS

“TAXPAYERS’ SCIENTISTS.”

LONDON, June 25

Several of the most important patents which chemical engineers from all over the world are inspecting at the Chemical Plant Exhibition in the Central Hall, Westminster, this week are the inventions of British Government They are part of the work of the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research, on which the taxpayers spend £500,000 a year. An official of the Department said yesterday that about 30 patents are applied for every year. Some of them are the means of saving hundreds of thousands of pounds to industry and of cutting down expensive foreign imports.i A typical example is' the new textile mercerising agent which can be manufactured for 4s a gallon, as compared with £1 a gallon paid for a foreign product. The latest Government invention is "quinoline,” a substance which prevents aeroplane fuel from corroding the magnesium-alloy tanks. The belief that “quinoline” actually improves the power of the petrol is now determined by further research. The most important invention by a “taxpayers’ scientist” in recent years is the Townend ring, a patent cowling for radial engines, which adds 8 or 10 m.p.h. to an aeroplane’s speed. It was invented by Dr. Townend, of the Department of Scientific and indusr trial Research. Sometimes what seems like a remarkable invention) comes to nothing. The Government has patented a process for obtaining petrol and oil from rubber. When it was invented rubber cost 2d per lb. Now, with rubber at 8d no one would think of exploiting it. Despite its many patents, the Department has no “professional” inventors. Almost all the discoveries come incidentally in the course of fundamental research. Dr. Townend, for instance, was studying aerodynamics not engine-cowling, when he devised his renjarkable ring. Often quite junior workers make the discoveries. While a senior scientist may be given the highly skilled, but unoriginal, task of making delicate measurements, his junior may be handling materials from which an unexpected process springs. Unlike commercial firms, Government scientists never keep their secrets longer than they can help. As soon as a new process or invention is seen to have commercial possibilities. it is passed on to British industry 1 .