From the Rolls-Royce experimental archive: a quarter of a million communications from Rolls-Royce, 1906 to 1960's. Documents from the Sir Henry Royce Memorial Foundation (SHRMF).
Costs and feasibility of casting brake drums in the reorganised iron foundry.
| Identifier | ExFiles\Box 120\1\ scan0192 | |
| Date | 17th June 1937 | |
| 1028 Hs.{Lord Ernest Hives - Chair} from Rm.{William Robotham - Chief Engineer} Rm{William Robotham - Chief Engineer}12/R.17.6.37. BRAKE DRUMS. We know that you are in the process of re-organising the iron foundry, and that you are anxious that it should have sufficient work to keep it profitably employed. We should like to bring to your notice the situation with regard to brake drums. We have been paying 44/- per cwt. for Millenite, and we recently ran some R.R. drums cast in our own Foundry. On completion of the tests we have not been able to standardise the drums because they say they cannot make them in the Foundry; furthermore, the saving in price is only 6d per drum. The reason Millenite is expensive is because it is melted in a high frequency furnace. It is difficult to say why our iron should be more expensive than Chromidium, which costs 35/- per cwt. and gives a profit at this figure. We cannot think of anything much more simple than a brake drum to cast. Perhaps we could make this a test case early on in the re-organisation of this part of the Works. Rm.{William Robotham - Chief Engineer} | ||