The Iron Giant
I know the Southwark-Emery as the Crusher. It earned this nickname from its annual demonstration at EOH. If you haven’t seen it, check it out this spring: the Crusher will load a 3-foot tall, 18-inch diameter pillar until failure, which means until the pillar is instantaneously crushed. The vibration from the pillar’s failure is enough to rattle the floor of the crane bay.
The Crusher gets its force from two hydraulic cylinders. The cylinders are powered by an adjustable stroke pumping unit located under the floor of the crane bay. The pumping unit draws oil from a supply tank that has an average capacity of 700 gallons. The two well-greased cylinders are threaded and run through a center piece that is moved up and down by their rotation. For compression tests, a plate called an Emery pressure capsule is attached to the center piece and forced downward by the cylinders, pressing on the specimen. In tensile testing, one end of the specimen is attached at the top of the Crusher’s frame, while the other end is attached by various methods to the center piece. The cylinders’ motion causes a downward tensile force on the specimen by the center piece.
Several TAM classes use the Crusher. For those of you planning to take TAM 252, you will get to design a load cell to be tested under compression by the machine. Other majors have classes that use the Crusher as well, such as CEE 300 which uses it for concrete testing.
I encourage checking out the Crusher. After all, it’s not every place that you can see an iron giant.