Engineering In Britain Research Articles

The rise of the civil engineering profession in Britain

In this paper, based on his James Sutherland History Lecture delivered to the Institution of Structural Engineers in 2020, Steven Brindle provides a brief history of civil engineering in Britain, charting its development from hydraulic projects and early attempts to apply intellect to structural design in the 17th century, through a great commercially driven boom in the Georgian era, to the foundations of the modern profession in the late 18th and early 19th centuries.

David Kirkaldy (1820–1897) and his museum of destruction: the visual dilemmas of an engineer as man of science

This paper examines codes of representation in nineteenth century engineering in Britain in relation to broader visual culture. While engineering was promoted as a rational public enterprise through techniques of spectacular display, engineers who aimed to be taken seriously in the intellectual hierarchies of science had to negotiate suitable techniques for making and using images. These difficulties can be examined in the visual practices that mark the career of engineer David Kirkaldy. Beginning as a bravura naval draughtsman, Kirkaldy later negotiated his status as a serious experimenter in material testing science, changing his style of representation that at first sight seems to be in line with the 'objective' strategy in science of getting nature to represent herself. And although Kirkaldy maintained a range of visual styles to communicate with different audiences, making rhetorical use of several technologies of inscription, from hand drawing to photography, nevertheless, his work does in fact demonstrate new uses of the concept of objectivity in representation when up against the practices of engineering. While these might seem merely pragmatic in comparison to the ethical weight given to the discourse of objective representation in science, in the messy world of collapsing bridges and law suits, virtuous engineers had to develop various forms of visual knowledge as practical science. This was not 'applied science' but a differentiated form of enquiry whose complexities hold as much interest as the better known visual cultures of late nineteenth century science or art.

Electrical technoscience and physics in transition, 1880–1920

This paper examines the shifting relationship between the academic disciplines of physics and electrical engineering in Britain c.1900, focusing on their shared engagement with new electrical technologies of lighting, power, and telecommunications. It examines these disciplines’ common cultures of patenting before the Great War, showing how “electricians” in these intersecting domains used patents to secure financial support and protection for their innovations. However, this common culture was put under strain by the attempts of physicists such as Oliver Lodge, to decouple their electrical researches from technological matters in order to pursue an agenda of so-called “pure science.” This campaign was made especially difficult by the strategic focus on “applied science” that emerged during the Great War. We show how a newly legitimized programme of state funding for electrical research both during and after the war led to academic physics and electrical engineering dropping their reliance on patenting by the 1920s, and in the process becoming autonomous sciences—each erasing stories of their former collaboration from disciplinary memories.

The Birth of the Modern Civil Engineers in Britain, 1760s ∼ 1860s

The Birth of the Modern Civil Engineers in Britain, 1760s ∼ 1860s

The theory and practice of steam engineering in Britain and France, 1800-1850

A characterization of the different patterns of technological development of France and Britain in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century which has been frequently put forward considers French engineers and scientists involved in the formulation and discovery of theoretical and general principles, whereas their British counterparts were mainly working using “rules of thumbs” and other similar forms of empirical know-how. At least, prima facie, the case of steam engineering seems to fit this broad characterization rather well. In this paper we provide a reconsideration of the different nature of French and British practices in steam engineering. Our study shows, that the different economic circumstances prevailing in Britain and France (in particular the price of coal) led the two countries to embark to different paths of accumulation of “useful knowledge” in the field of steam engineering.

Celebrating innovators in engineering

PurposeIn looking to ensure that engineers receives the recognition they deserve, the Royal Academy of Engineering, which provides a voice for Britain's engineering community, annually awards a number of medals to the very best of British engineering talent.Design/methodology/approachThis briefing is prepared by an independent writer who adds their own impartial comments and places the articles in context.FindingsFive of the UK's finest engineers have won the Royal Academy of Engineering's prestigious Silver Medal for their outstanding personal contribution to British engineering. These contributions include the successful development and commercialization of Snake Arm Robots; research into “high volume” carbon fiber composite structures; helping to revolutionize the computing world through virtualization, and major developments in membrane technology, which could significantly improve the energy efficiency of industrial processes. In addition, biomedical engineer Dr Silvia Schievano has won the 2009 Sir George MacFarlane Medal from the Academy, which has been awarded for her pioneering work in engineering patient‐specific heart valves.Originality/valueThe briefing saves busy executives and researchers hours of reading time by selecting only the very best, most pertinent information and presenting it in a condensed and easy‐to‐digest format.

The military influence on engineering education in Britain and India, 1848–1906

The original colleges for military engineers—the Royal Military Academy (RMA) Woolwich and the East India Company (EIC) Seminary at Addiscombe—were the only outlet for a curriculum based on the theory and practice of engineering taught within an academically orientated institution in Britain during the nineteenth century. Overall, engineering in Britain was taught through work-related traditional apprenticeship systems that focused on the ‘practical man’ concept, supported from 1853 onwards with funding based on a payments-by-results system administered by the Department of Science and Art. This trend continued despite the introduction of modest engineering faculties within the British university system. In India, matters were different: there were four colleges of civil engineering, the oldest, Thomason College, having been founded in 1847. Their role was to provide civil engineers for the Indian Public Works Department. Both in Britain and in India, the administration and management of science, technical and engineering education was undertaken by officers from the Royal Engineers and the Indian Army equivalent, (commonly referred to as sapper officers). This trend in civil/military relationships continued with the establishment of the Royal Indian Engineering College (also known as Cooper’s Hill College) in 1870, specifically to train civil engineers in England for duties with the Indian Public Works Department. The comparisons between engineering education in Britain and India during the nineteenth century are stark. The role of the military in the development of engineering education both in Britain and India was crucial. The Indian Public Works Department, although technically a civilian organisation, relied on military engineers during its life until 1947. An examination of the topic from both the British and Indian perspective gives an insight not only into comparative engineering education but also into the civil/military relationships that existed in Britain and India during the latter half of the nineteenth century.

Engineering design in the time of Thomas Telford

Thomas Telford, the Institution of Civil Engineers' first president, was born 250 years ago this year. His career spanned a half-century that saw some of the most remarkable changes in the way European engineers approached the design of buildings, bridges and machines. This paper reviews the development of engineering design, science and education during Telford's era, revealing that Britain was then far behind France, Germany and other European countries. Through the work of Telford and others, Britain's engineers embraced the practical experimental approach that scientists throughout Europe had developed in the eighteenth century to generate new engineering knowledge and understanding. By the early nineteenth century Britain was emerging as a leading engineering nation.

‘Laying a foundation of fact’: Fabianism and the information society thesis

This article explores affinities between postindustrialism and modes of thinking characteristic of the Fabian Society, especially in the first half of the twentieth century. In the hands of Daniel Bell and others, the information society thesis postulates the coming of a postindustrial society marked by the centrality of information and knowledge. While caveats abound in Bell's version, the thesis has been generally optimistic in outlook, portraying postindustrial society as an advanced level of social development. Interestingly, the Fabian Society, a British-based organization highly influential in the twentieth-century project of social democracy, also emphasized information in its advocacy of social progress: ‘laying a foundation of fact’, according to one commentator, was a key ingredient of the Fabian approach. Texts by thinkers such as Sidney Webb and H.G. Wells suggest that ‘informationalism’, a commitment to information in an original sense of hard facts and figures, must indeed be construed as the essence of Fabianism, as that which distinguishes the Fabians from more metaphysical or emotional expressions of socialism. The article traces the link between information-powered politics and the largely successful practice of social engineering in Britain. However, social engineering can, and in the case of some Fabians did, degenerate into a technocratic and even totalitarian mindset. Critiques of Fabianism are therefore also acknowledged here, including those claiming that the Fabian preoccupation with data-gathering and filing, its ‘proceduralism’, actually constituted a major weakness. However, given its noble informational ideal, Fabianism can, the article concludes, illuminate contemporary information society problems. The Fabian tradition contains suggestive materials on such topical themes as fair access to information, the role of facts in progressive politics, and the prospects for an international institutional order.

German rocket engineers in Britain—Their influence revisited

The technical aspects of the arrival and work of the German rocket engineers or scientists (referred to as engineers from now on) who came to Britain after World War 2 have been covered in a previous work [J. Becklake, German engineers: their contribution to British rocket technology after World War II, AAS History Series 22 (1998) 157–172; in: P. Jung (Ed.), 27th History Symposium of the IAA, Graz, Austria, October, 1993]. This paper considers the origins and work of these Germans while in Germany, where they were employed in Britain, their interaction with British colleagues both at work and at play and finally looks at their overall influence on British rocket technology. The final destinations of the British Germans will be covered. Although many stayed for only a short time before moving on to, e.g. the USA or back to Germany, a number stayed in England for the rest of their lives and their descendants are still there.

Towards risk-based flood hazard management in the UK

Flood engineering in Britain is evolving from traditional approaches based on design standards to the development of risk-based decision-making, which involves taking account of a range of loads, defence system responses and impacts of flooding. Adopting such a ‘whole systems’ approach enables combinations of structural and non-structural approaches to be assessed and compared so resources can be targeted to best effect. Building on methods and know-how already in widespread use in river and coastal engineering, risk-analysis techniques are now being adopted in all areas—from high-level planning based on outline analysis to detailed designs using high-resolution simulation models. This paper explores some of the new techniques of this emerging approach to flood risk management.

Towards risk-based flood hazard management in the UK

Flood engineering in Britain is evolving from traditional approaches based on design standards to the development of risk-based decision-making, which involves taking account of a range of loads, defence system responses and impacts of flooding. Adopting such a ‘whole systems’ approach enables combinations of structural and non-structural approaches to be assessed and compared so resources can be targeted to best effect. Building on methods and know-how already in widespread use in river and coastal engineering, risk-analysis techniques are now being adopted in all areas—from high-level planning based on outline analysis to detailed designs using high-resolution simulation models. This paper explores some of the new techniques of this emerging approach to flood risk management.

`But What is a Chemical Engineer?': Profiling the Membership of the British Institution of Chemical Engineers, 1922–1956

This paper examines the membership of the professionalassociation of chemical engineering in Britain – the Institutionof Chemical Engineers – during its first three decades. Usingcollective methods of biography, it explores how long it took forclear boundaries to develop between this membership and the widerchemical community. Delineation was linked to the development ofan academic discipline. This paper argues that the indeterminateconstituency of the IChemE delayed growth, but allowed it to playa key role in shaping the development of the new profession.

Professional identity and organisation in a technical occupation: The emergence of chemical engineering in Britain, c. 1915–30

The emergence in Britain of chemical engineering, by mid‐century the fourth largest engineering specialism, was a hesitant and drawn out process. This article analyses the organisational politics behind the recognition of the technical occupation and profession from the First World War through to the end of the 1920s. The collective sense of professional identity among nascent ‘chemical engineers’ developed rapidly during this time owing to associations which promoted their cause among potential patrons.

Decades of change: contributions of geomorphology to fluvial and coastal engineering and management

Major developments in the contribution of geomorphology to engineering and environmental management have taken place over the past ten years in the United Kingdom, particularly in the coastal and fluvial spheres. Considerable achievements have been gained in raising awareness of the nature of geomorphic processes and their dynamics, and of how the understanding of geomorphology can aid effective management and decisions on engineering strategies. Specifically, this has meant gaining an understanding of interconnectedness in geomorphic systems and the long-term variability of processes and landforms. Radical changes in both policies and decision-making frameworks have taken place such that the approach to coastal and river management adopted by the British Government is now to ‘work with nature’. Likewise, management structures have been implemented to facilitate and encourage integrated planning. Such changes have not, of course, occurred from the influence of geomorphologists alone, but they do align policy much more with geomorphological principles than in the past. Examples are presented of geomorphological involvement in coastal engineering in Britain. Engineering geomorphology is now in a second phase of answering geomorphological questions, providing geomorphological information, and implementing management in accordance with the principles advocated. This is involving much case-study work at specific locations. A third phase of major development in the future is envisaged in this paper, mainly stemming from major changes in geomorphology itself and underlain by radical alterations of scientific theories, philosophy, and methods. This will involve modelling and predicting responses in ways that adequately deal with complexity, positive feedback, non-linearity, and holism. Questions remain, with regard to the links between geomorphology and engineering, about the type of predictions that are possible and acceptable, and about the extent to which geomorphology will provide solutions, both nationally and internationally. Whatever strategies or solutions are suggested, there remains the issue of political acceptability in specific applications and the need for mechanisms to make public gain compatible with private loss. Geomorphologists arguably have the potential for another major leap forward, stimulated by theoretical and technological developments, in which the results of research will feed directly into environmental engineering, provided that the requisite spatial and temporal data are available.

Civil Engineers and Engineering in Britain, 1600-1830

Civil Engineers and Engineering in Britain, 1600-1830

Innovation, diffusion, and mechanical engineers in Britain, 1780-1850

In a wide-ranging examination of the role of capital goods' suppliers in stimulating and spreading technical innovation during the nineteenth century, MacLeod focuses attention upon the much neglected mechanical engineering industry.2 Her assessment of that industry's achievements is based on a comparison with innovation and diffusion within user industries, considering mainly textiles and textile machine making. Using evidence extracted from patent records, she goes on to claim that machine makers played little part in developing 'radical inventions', and that commercial exploitation of such inventions ran counter to the interests of the engineering industry.3 While emphasizing the importance of the patent system, MacLeod also stresses the role of secrecy in inhibiting technological diffusion. This interest in the role of engineers, and in the mechanism of innovation, is very welcome, and the questions raised are important ones. But the whole picture is more complex than MacLeod has recognized, with considerable diversity between regions and industries, and a notable shift in attitudes towards secrecy during the course of the century. This comment questions some of MacLeod's assumptions about relationships within textile engineering, and between engineers and their customers, and consequently raises doubts about some of her conclusions concerning the flow of technological information. Secondly, it suggests that as patents were rarely used by textile innovators before i850, patent records cannot be an adequate basis for generalization. Thirdly, it argues that to separate inventions into 'radical' and 'incremental' categories actually impedes an understanding of the complex process of innovation.

Innovation, Diffusion, and Mechanical Engineers in Britain, 1780-1850

Innovation, Diffusion, and Mechanical Engineers in Britain, 1780-1850

Innovation and the Skill Mix: Chemicals and Engineering in Britain and Germany

In recent years continued disparities between countries in economic performance combined with the rapid pace of technological change have led to growing interest in com parisons of 'national systems of innovation'. The devel opment of this concept reflects increased awareness of both the cumulative, informal nature of much innovative activity—especially the interaction between producers and prospective users of new products—and the ways in which national-institutional structures condition the decisions taken by key actors in the innovative process such as enterprises, universities, and individual engin eers, scientists and other members of the labour force (Lundvall, 1988; Freeman, 1988; Westney, 1993; Sos kice, 1993). Analysis of 'national' innovation systems has obvious limitations: rapid growth in trans-national corporate activity continues to reduce the influence of national policy regimes and, conversely, recent studies of localised RD Audretsch and Vivarel li, 1994). However, it seems likely that at least some institutions operating at a national level do influence relative innovative performance, for example, insti tutions underpinning the domestic supply of finance to industry and the education and training of the workforce. In this note we focus on the role of the latter set of institutions. Specifically, we draw on a recent study based on the chemicals and engineering industries in Britain and Germany to explore the links between inter-country differences in human capital formation and apparent disparities between the two countries in technological performance.(1) Long-term comparisons of investments in RD specialised intermediates Engineering: vehicle components; specialised high speed machinery The ordering of the note is as follows: Section 2 reports on comparisons of the recent performance of closely matched pairs of British and German production plants in the two industries. Section 3 assesses the mix of skills which companies need to respond effectively to inten sifying competitive pressures to speed up the rate of new product development and innovations in production processes. In Section 4 we examine in detail recent chang es in the employment of highly-qualified engineers and scientists in Britain and Germany and relate such changes to the high and growing level of technical

Professional organisation, employers and the education of engineers for management: A comparison of mechanical, electrical and chemical engineers in Britain, 1897?1977

THE SMALL FRACTION of managers in British manufacturing who have a training and experience in engineering is a theme of recurrent interest to politicians, high officials and academic students of the engineering profession in the British economy. Many studies have sought to place at least part of the blame for this phenomenon on to the higher educational system? This line of analysis is popular with engineers who are critical of the failings of their profession since it suggests that all is required is a remedial training in managerial studies? Others, particularly academics, would place less emphasis on the formative influence of higher education. 3 Indeed, some historians have recently disagreed with this explanation. They place more stress on the role of the firm in determining the level of demand for particular engineering skills, and hence for certain kinds of academic training? Another line of analysis regards the evolution of degree courses in engineering as the outcome of discussions between the several groups having an interest in the engineering profession. From my own studies I would tentatively conclude that the scale of provision and the substance of managerial education for engineers were the consequences of negotiations between two groups of professionals,