Plane Scanner

Series

Series Name

Living Tomorrow

Issue

Issue No.

252

Date Released

1980

Length of issue (in feet)

517

Stories in this Issue:

1. 1Tennis Umpire
2. 2Watercress Packer
3. 3Plane Scanner
4. 4Crying Mouse Trap

Story

Story No. within this Issue

3 / 4

Summary

COI synopsis: Because just one malfunction in a plane can have such disastrous effects, safety checks on planes verge on the obsessive; not just for the moving parts, but every rivet on the wings - and there are thousands. Sample rivets are drilled out and checks made for metal fatigue cracks round them. It takes hundreds of hours. But now an ultrasonic scanner sidles crabwise over the wings and projects a picture of the metal skin round the rivet. Flaws are revealed immediately: safety is achieved and man hours are saved.

Keywords

Aviation; Aircraft; Science and technology; Engineering; Inventions and discoveries; Design

Written sources

COI Microfilm Roll 55 [BFI National Archive]   Used for synopsis

COI Reference

MI 1458/252

Credits:

Sponsor

Central Office of Information (COI)

Sponsor

Foreign & Commonwealth Office

This series is held by:

Film Archive

Name

British Film Institute (BFI)

Email

For BFI National Archive enquiries:
nonfictioncurators@bfi.org.uk
For commercial/footage reuse enquiries:
footage.films@bfi.org.uk

Web

http://collections-search.bfi.org.uk/web

Phone

020 7255 1444

Fax

020 7580 7503

Address

21 Stephen Street
London W1T 1LN

Notes

The BFI National Archive also preserves the original nitrate film copies of British Movietone News, British Paramount News, Empire News Bulletin, Gaumont British News, Gaumont Graphic, Gaumont Sound News and Universal News (the World War II years are covered by the Imperial War Museum).

Series held

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