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TIME spent and expense incurred in making jigs, fixtures and some other production tools have been reduced substantially during a tooling simplification programme conducted for more than five years by the Republic Aviation Corporation, of Farmingdale, NY, USA.

ALL essential data on operation, performance and stresses of a new‐model aircraft in flight test are picked up, transmitted and recorded automatically by a radio system developed and built by Vultec Aircraft Inc., of Downey, California. The indications of seventy‐two different instruments in the machine can be transmitted a distance of about 100 miles and recorded simultaneously at a ground station at a maximum speed of 100 instrument readings per second.

HOLLOW steel airscrew‐blades which, it is claimed, are stronger, weigh no more, and are less susceptible to impact and abrasion than forged aluminium blades of the same size are being manufactured in quantity from seamless steel tubing by the American Propeller Corporation, a subsidiary of the Aviation Corporation. The conception of using tubing for blade making is logical, but the difficulties of putting it into practice were great and required the development of many new methods and production tools. For the following description and accompanying illustrations, the author is indebted to the Propeller Corporation and to supplemental information contained in an article in Steel written by A. H. Allen, Detroit editor of that journal.

FIRST doubling, then tripling of the rate of production of the Lockheed Lightning fighter without expansion of plant size has been made possible, by ingenious engineering adaptation of automobile chain‐line assembly practice to aircraft manufacture. The accompanying illustrations show clearly some of the features of this system.

AIRCRAFT production engineers have long sought detailed information regarding the laminated wood construction process which has been under development for a number of years by the Duramold division of the Fairchild Engine and Airplane Corp. for production of the company's AT‐21 advanced trainer and PT‐19 Army patrol‐torpedo planes. This information has been made generally available, however, only since the end of 1943, after success of the development had been proved not only experimentally but in production operations of considerable volume.

MANY months can be saved in tooling for production a new type aeroplane by use of a master tooling dock invented by Leland A. Bryant, of Beverly Hills, California, whose patents have been acquired by the Consolidated Vultee Aircraft Corp. In the foreword to a manual describing the principles, construction and use of the dock, prepared by the inventor for the Corporation, C. W. Perelle, vice‐president of manufacturing, states that Consolidated has been extremely fortunate to be the first manufacturers to utilize fully the principles of this remarkable new positioning device, which has opened up an important field in manufacturing.

MORE progress in the art of powder metallurgy is said to have been madcin the last year in the United States than in the preceding ten years. The new developments and great expansion of production by this method are direct consequences of the demand for the fastest possible output of the largest possible volume of equipment for war. This objective is attained in part by taking advantage of the speed with which duplicate parts of machines can be pressed from powdered metals.

ENGINEERING of the Airocobra fighter proceeded from the conviction of the Bell Aircraft Co., of Buffalo, N.Y., at the time of its organization in 1935, that a superior interceptor must combine the highest attainable speed with utmost destructive fire power, and therefore would have to be different from any then produced by‐established aircraft companies in the United States.

Pre‐employment medical examinations with appropriate testing are required in many industries—a basic tenet of Occupational Medicine—and it has long been a recommendation of many in community medicine and environmental health for those food handlers whose close contact with open food, aspects of its preparation, processing, sale, exposure for sale, make their personal health important and in prevention of diseases and may constitute a health hazard to food consumers. Epidemiological studies have revealed too many instances of a human source of disease, especially in milk and water, for this to be denied or under‐estimated. Food poisioning outbreaks caused by a carrier, of chronic or limited duration, enable those investigating such outbreaks to see there could be advantages in medical screening of certain employees especially in certain areas of food trades. The main problem is to decide the extent of the discipline and who should be subject to it. The fact that by far the majority of the examinations and tests will prove negative should not be seen as removing the need for the service. After all, there are a number of similar circumstances in public health. Meat inspection, for example, in which a 100% inspection of all food animals slaughtered for human food is now fully established, it is not suggested that inspections should in any way be reduced despite the fact that a number of the diseases, eg., tuberculosis, no longer occurs as it once did, which was the prime cause of meat inspection being brought into being. Other areas where routine medical examinations reveal satisfactory health with only a few isolated cases requiring attention, is the school medical service. Here, the “de‐bunkers” have had some success, but if children are not regularly examined at vulnerable age levels and especially in between where the occasion demands, there is no question that much will be missed and ill‐health progress to a chronic state.