INVENTORS HELP

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 3, Issue 265, 31 January 1941, Page 6

INVENTORS HELP

IDEAS FOR ENDING WAR

400 RECEIVED EACH WEEK

A net to catch parachutists is one of many Heath Robinson ideas put forward to help in ending the Avar quickly. It is one of the suggestions that into tin lintisii Ministry of Supplf* Research Department at the rate of some 400 a week. The net. it is proposed., should- contain pockets, and as the parachutist fell into one of these, a bell Avould ring to indicate a "catch."

A number of Ihe ideas received do possess the germs of possibilities, and some are of practical assistance in developing and improving inventions already in existence. They come from all classes—more often than not without any thought of reward. Particularly useful ideas have come from inventive working men. Professor E. N. da C. Andrade, scientific adA'iscr to the Directorate of Scientific Research, Ministry of Supply, told a reporter that all ideas received are investigated most carefully, although it may be that only perhaps two to four of the 400 are adopted. He had had offers from scA'eral doAVsers, or Avater-diviners, claiming that they could loeate metals "and so help to find unexploded bombs,, but these claims had produced nothing like positiA r e results. Defeating Ihe Night Bomber Work Avas still proceeding on various lines in the hope of finding an effective means of defeating the night bomber. There could be no general cure, said the Professor, but it might Jbc made possible to produce deA'ices by which the enemy casualties would be so heavy that it would not Me Avorth their while to continue with this form of terrorism. Particular attention Avas being paid to improved methods of location and obtaining greater accuracy from antiaircraft shells.

Sqitic of the proposals from ■which positive results have been obtained relate to searchlights, anti-aircraft gunnery prediction, reinforced concrete, Avoiding armour-plate, camouflage, and comfort for the troops. From Avorking men haA r e come practical ideas for stopping leaks in petrol tanks, Avood joining, automatic adjustment of brake shoes, anti-tank devices and booby traps. Some have been adopted and may prove of industrial value after the Avar.

"Nothing has come in of a really revolutionary nature," said Professor Andrade, "but wc are glad to get these ideas and investigate them • Eccentric ideas include bayonet attachments to soldiers' boots so as to give the enemy a healthy kick, a bayonet which springs out of the ride on pressing a button, and the dropping of snakes and scorpion, si over enemy, territory—some suggested hungry rats. There is a whole class of inventors who think that infra-red rays will do anything. Hundreds of ways of dealing with invaders have been suggested. "Death ray" ideas have gone far beyond the known limits of science. One ray inventor from America claimed to have brought down pigeons flying ;Tt 20 000 feet. But,, as Professor Andrade pointed; ou't„ n pigeon at thai height—if it could reach it—would be frozen to death.