 | The University of Virginia record February 1, 1931 |  |
EXPERIMENTAL ENGINEERING LABORATORIES
Road Materials Laboratory.—The apparatus for tests of non-bituminous
road materials includes a two-cylinder Deval abrasion machine, a ball mill, a
moulding press for briquettes of rock dust, a Page impact cementation tester,
a Page impact toughness tester, a rock crusher and a Purdue brick rattler.
This outfit the University owes to the generous aid of the late Dr. Logan
Waller Page. In addition, the Department has acquired a 40,000-pound compression
tester, a diamond core drill, a diamond rock saw, a grinding lap, a
Westphal balance, specific gravity apparatus, and a complete set of sieves.
Useful researches in the road-building rocks and gravels of Virginia, as well
as the standard tests, are conducted each year by the class in Civil Engineering.
The apparatus for tests of bituminous road materials includes the New
York Testing Laboratory penetrometer, the Kirschbaum ductility machine,
the Engler viscosimeter, the asphalt viscosimeter, the New York Testing
Laboratory extractor, the New York State Board of Health oil tester, Hubbard
pyknometers, asphalt flow plates, gas and electric hot plates, and the
accessory apparatus needed for research on bituminous road-binders.
Structural Materials Laboratory.—The Sinclair Laboratory for work in
testing structural materials was founded on the original donation of Mrs. John
Sinclair, of New York City, as a memorial to her late husband. The collection
has since been considerably enlarged. It contains a Riehle 100,000-pound
machine, arranged for tensile, compressive, and transverse tests, with an attachment
for taking autographic diagrams; an Olsen 100,000-pound machine
and fitted with a suspended ball compression block; a 200,000-pound Olsen
machine suitable for compressive tests and also supplied with extension arms
for making transverse tests of beams; an Olsen torsion machine of 50,000
inch-pounds capacity; an Olsen impact-testing machine of 100 foot-pounds
capacity; three machines of rotating beam type for fatigue tests of metals; Shore
scleroscope; a Ewing machine for finding the modulus of elasticity; hand machines
for testing rods and wires under pull, and small specimens of timber and
cast iron under transverse loads. It is also equipped with accessory measuring
instruments; these include a Henning extensometer, an Olsen compressometer, and
a Ewing optical extensometer of great delicacy.
The laboratory is completely equipped for making tests of cement, cement
aggregates, and concrete. It contains a Fairbank's tensile tester of
1,000 pounds capacity; a compressometer for concrete specimens; Riehle dial
compressometer for concrete specimens; Riehle dial compressometer-extensometer
for specimens up to 3-inch diameter; tools for shearing tests of
concrete; an Olsen steaming oven for accelerated tests; a Freas electric drying
oven with automatic temperature regulation; moist air closets; sieves for
mechanical analysis; moulds for tension and compression tests; and the required
small apparatus.
Fuel and Oil Laboratory.—For the determination of the heating value
of coal, petroleum, etc., the laboratory has an Emerson bomb calorimeter.
For gas and liquid fuel calorimetry, a Junker calorimeter made by the
furnaces, a Freas electric drying oven with automatic temperature regulation,
sample crusher and grinder, a Brown high resistance pyrometer, balances, platinum
crucibles, etc. For investigating lubricants, the laboratory is equipped with
such apparatus as flash and chill point testers, hydrometers, viscosimeters, etc.,
used in the determination of the physical properties of oil.
Hydraulics Laboratory.—The laboratory equipment for work in hydraulics
comprises a steel tank for weir experiments with interchangeable
bronze notches; a hook gauge for measurement of surface levels; a standpipe
provided with a set of standard bronze orifices for experiments on
efflux; commercial pipe and elbows arranged for determining friction losses;
Gurley current meter; and the necessary scales, tanks, manometers, etc. It
also includes a pump which is piped to circulate water from a cement cistern
to a tank in the attic of the building.
Additional equipment of this laboratory is a motor driven centrifugal
pump with a capacity of 350 gallons per minute at 100 feet head, equipped
with a Venturi meter and the necessary piping, valves and gauges to provide
for complete performance tests on the pump. This unit also supplies water
at constant pressure for the other hydraulic tests. Recently added were a motor
driven centrifugal pump with a capacity of 300 gallons per minute at 500 feet
head, and a Pelton wheel manufactured by the Pelton Wheel Company expressly
for laboratory use.
Power Laboratory.—The laboratory is equipped to illustrate the theory
involved in Mechanical Engineering; to give practical instruction in the handling
of machinery; and to teach the fundamental methods of experimental
work. It contains a Ball high-speed engine; a De Laval turbine with condensing
and non-condensing nozzles, which is direct-connected to a 20-kva.
alternating-current generator; an Otto gasoline engine with a special piston
for alcohol; a White and Middleton 12 HP. Engine (gasoline or illuminating
gas); two Liberty aeroplane motors; a Wheeler surface condenser to which
the exhaust from any of the steam units may be connected; a Sturtevant
engine and blower; an air compressor; an A. B. C. Pitot tube; a steam pump;
steam traps, etc. For boiler tests, the boilers of the University Heating and
Lighting Plant are used.
The instrument room contains all necessary apparatus for carrying out
complete tests. Among this may be mentioned indicators, thermometers,
gauges, planimeters, with standards for their correction and calibration; two
types of Orsat apparatus; separating and throttling calorimeters, etc.
| The University of Virginia record February 1, 1931 | |