LOSSES THROUGH NOISE

Hokitika Guardian, 2 November 1929, Page 2

LOSSES THROUGH NOISE

£50,0C0,0C0 YEARLY IN ENGLAND

FAMOUS EXPERTS 'SUGGESTS REMEDIES.

ABATEMENT OF UNIVERSAL NUISANCIiO.

(By Professor A. M. Low.)

The recent announcement that the British Ministry of Transport is contemplating legislation to forbid the blowing of motor horns after a certain hour and on stationary vehicles shows that our rulers have at last awakened to the fact that it is as necessary to control noise as to control bad smells and bad sights. It is evc,n contemplated that raucous horns causing distress to the public ear shall be banned.

This merely suggests that the - legislators have no real knowledge of sound or the function of motor horns. If we stop to think for a minute, it is obvious that horns must be mucous and unpleasant. That is their function—to attract attention and therefore warn the unwary. The use of motor horns with a musical note or merely a discreet noise would be to send up the already appalling death roll in our streets,

Perhaps the most notable thing about noise in relation to life is the ease with which the human ear adjusts itself. If our ears were sensitive to the same degree as these of our ancestors we should find life unbearable. The quarrels of our neiglibivrs, ins'ead of sounding li.ie a distant farmyard, would seem like a thunder storm, and a policeman walking up and down the road would be sufficient to keep us awake. all night. So with the motor horns. M e have gradually become used to them, and it is the duty of the expert to evolve new notes which will attract our attention by startling us. If the hooters, produce notes that combine With others and are carried upon them, we might well ha soothed instead of being made to jump, for life. I have come across instance of men after being near machinery tor years, found it lulling. When they went away for then’ holidays they could not sleep because of the silence. Perfect silence, l : ke continuous noise, is terrifying, for it allows us literally to hear the rustling of our eyelids!

THE PERFECT MOTOR HORN. The object of designing the perfect motor horn should be to produce an instrument that will give a startling note, and' one to which the ear will not easily become accustomed, yet it must ibe sufficiently' musical for its note to be memorised as a warning. I believe that in the near future we may. have typical noises for certain vehicles, just as at the moment, we know the locomotive by its whistle and the fire engine by its bell. It should certainly be illegal for anyone to use these exact notes on bicycles or cars. The trouble with motor horns is not that they startle people in the road, but that they annoy the quiet shopper who is on the pavement. If we damp the horns so that they are no longer distressing, the man in the road will be sacrificed to the comfort of the man on the pavement. Obviously what is required is a selective motor born that will Ibe heard only by those in danger. Experiments are being made, and this may become a reality in the near future.

Equally effective, bv.lt .more difficult and unpractical, would be on apparatus to be worn on the bead which made “inaudible” sounds audible. Everyone knows that animals hear sounds that we cannot. It is possible to emit a dog whistle which the animal can hear, but which a man standing near you would not notice. People asleep in houses near the main road would no longer be awakened ibv horns, while those in the road, wearing their special earcaps, would be fully alive to the dangers of speed. But I mention this more as a point of interest than in the hope that it will be possible in realitv.

Hardly less important is the ndlse in a motor car, and the problem is at the moment giving our manufacturers gravely to think. The uncertainty of our climate and the demand of civilised man for comfort has resulted in the saloon car. Unfortunately, the saloon, while it keeps out the rain, keeps in the noise and often acts as a sounding boards, amplifying it until, on a long journey, it has distressing effects. Headaches, travel sickness, and other things that spoil motoring are all due an a great degree to vibration and noise. EFFECT ON OUTPUT AND EFFICIENCY. The solution lies, not in trying to eliminate all noise, for that will be impossible until engineering roaches perfection, hut in making it of such quality that it does not irritate. Not every noise hurts the human system. I have visited a factory where the carrier hum of a flywheel has been causing sickness and headaches amongst all within a mile. Bj photograph,ng the sound I have di.--covered its quality, and the addition of a tiny weight has changed its note so that it no longer combines with other waves to produce irritating effects.

We in England are at present losing some millions a year thiough noise. The exact figure given bv an export is £50,000,000. Tlie typiste who returns home jaded because of the noise through which she has worked and travelled is the commonest victim. The elimination of that