Volume Eleven - Pre-Victorian to the Present Day - some more aspects - Large Testing Machines in South Wales, 1829-1906 . . .

We fast forward from the mid-1860's to August 1884, when a delegation from the Institution of Mechanical Engineers visited the Lloyd's Bute Proving House. The report of the visit was published within the Proceedings of the Institution : -

Lloyd's Bute Proving House

Contains two powerful hydraulic machines, which indicate the strains applied by levers and dead weights. The breaking machine tests up to 250 tons, and is fitted with duplex hydraulic gauges, one of which indicates from 1 lb. to 6000 lbs. per sq. inch, and the other from 1 lb. to 1000 lbs., for experimental and light testing.

The tensile machine, the bed of which is 15 fathoms long, tests up to 180 tons. The hydraulic shears are capable of exerting a force of 150 tons, and are fitted with gauges to indicate the pressure applied in shearing iron and other cold metals.In addition to the ordinary testing of chain-cables and anchors, experimental testing of iron, steel, wood, concrete, &c., is also carried out.

On the occasion of the visit of the Members on Wednesday afternoon, 6th August, the following tensile tests were made by the superintendent, Mr. George W. Penn, upon three samples from a round bar rolled from blooms made of scrap iron.

The first sample, tested with the skin on, was 1.56 inch diameter, and broke at a total load of 43.20 tons, equivalent to 22.61 tons per square inch, with a good fracture line, fine and fibrous . . . .

Drawings were exhibited of nine anchors which had been tested to destruction, showing the fractures as they took place in testing.