THE DUKE OF KENT AS INCENDIARY.

Horowhenua Chronicle, 8 February 1936, Page 7

THE DUKE OF KENT AS INCENDIARY.

(Pressing down switches at the new Fire Testing Station at Boreham Wood, Elstree, recently, the Duke of Kent made the first fire-resistance test of a building material ever carried out in England, says the “Daily Telegraph.” The testing station, erected by the Fire Offices’ Committee, which comprises all the tariff fire insurance companies of Great Britain, is the only station in the country where building elements, such as walls, floors, coalings, and pillars, can be submitted to those tests of fire, pressure, and water which the British Standards Institution lays down as the standard of fire-resistance.

In opening the station, the Duke said :

“This station is an excellent example of the foresight and sense of public service of the insurance companies. “For the first time in this country a concrete made of foamed slag has been used in this building, and there is a prospect that the development of its use may bring some assistance to our basic industries.

“1 understand that the contractors of the building believe so much in the qualities of this material that they have asked that it should be made the subject of the first test to be carried out here.” t

His Royal Highness then moved to the control room, pressed the switches, and to the accompaniment of a highpitched whistling sound, batteries of burners in a mobile furnace that had been moved against the wall to be tested began to play their flames against the brickwork. Although the furnace kept flames at a temperature of 1200 deg F. playing on one side of the wall for some minutes, the wall on the other side was not even warm at the end of the testIt is claimed for this material, a German invention, never before used in England, that it is far lighter and far cheaper than the gravels of which cement building blocks have hitherto been made, requires the addition of less cement, and has four and a half times the heat-insulating properties.

The first plant for its manufacture in Great Britain has been erected in Lincolnshire, where slag heaps at Richard Thomas’s Ironworks have supplied the ram material. The manufacturers hone to be able to utilise the vast slag heaps of .Middlesbrough, GlasManchester, and other centres, and to convert enormous quantities of waste into valuable building material. In welcoming the Duke to the station the chairman of the Fire Officers’ Committee, Mr. A, S. Henshclwood, said if this use of blast-furnace slag were widely developed it would bring addilionai relief to areas which had suffered severely in recent years.