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).
Letter from Reinforced Plastics Ltd. proposing the use of patented wire-cotton fabric for motor car construction, including test results from the R.A.E.
| Identifier | ExFiles\Box 142\2\ scan0496 | |
| Date | 4th February 1943 | |
| REINFORCED PLASTICS LTD. Handwritten notes: Rm{William Robotham - Chief Engineer}, #1, Car files, 1200, 2/? TELEPHONE. KINGSTON 4603 DIRECTORS: SIR WM. YARWORTH-JONES (CHAIRMAN & MANAGING) SIR HERBERT A.{Mr Adams} WALKER, C.B GLENCOE, QUEENS ROAD, KINGSTON HILL, SURREY. February 4th, 1943. The Managing Director, Messrs. Rolls Royce, Ltd. -- -- -- -- -- Plastic Boards made from Interwoven Tensile Steel Wire-Cotton Fabric (Patented) -- -- -- -- -- Dear Sir, As I think you may be interested in the above mentioned material, I attach extracts from report of results of tests made by the R.A.E., Farnborough, since when, the R.A.E. (on Friday last) made an IZOD TEST - the result being 16ft.lb., which is, of course, very good. If plastic material will enter into your motor car construction I suggest that as the impact strength of our armour fabric is about six times that of the best laminated - whether paper or fabric - that you would wish to inquire into its possibilities. Production has been reached and we have just completed an order for the Southern Railway for 880-yds. of 36" width - 3/32" thick for front, back and sides and doors of goods wagons. These Southern Railway plastic sheets are a thermo-setting plastic manufactured under heat and pressure, which can be sprung to gentle double curvature; but the armour fabric could be introduced into a thermoplastic material which could be shaped under heat and pressure. If you would wish to examine some samples we would send you a piece of the armour fabric before processing; a piece cut from a waste strip of the plasticised 3/32" board supplied to the Southern Railway. The construction of the above samples is as follows: It contains 24 high tensile .010" steel wires woven with cotton - and at the same time; 24 similar wires and cotton woven in the weft; the wires have a breaking load of approx. 27-lb. to sq.in. (about 130 tons to sq.ft.) The R.A.E. Test Report, as you see, gives over 24,000-lb. per sq.ft., both longitudinally and transversely, and as stated, the R.A.E. IZOD Test 16ft.lb. Yours faithfully, REINFORCED PLASTICS, LTD. [Signature] W. Yarworth-Jones DIRECTOR. | ||