Discussion on "Trends in machine tool design" at the Birmingham Section of the Institution

MR. E. W. FIELD (Section President) said that the first point which had struck him had been the lecturer\´s very commonsense attitude on co-operation between ultimate user and designer. Speaking strictly from the machine tool maker\´s point of view, problems were often thrown at them without any help at all, and their resultant efforts were criticised with the statement, " We thought of that years ago." The question of creating special machines for the use of the high speed steel type of material, and other special machines for the tungsten carbide material, was hardly a practical proposition, and most makers, so far as he could gather, were proceeding on the lines which Mr. Wright had indicated, by building machines capable of running at high or low speeds to suit the material.