Meredith Thring

Meredith Wooldridge Thring (17 December 1915 – 15 September 2006) was a British inventor, engineer, futurologist, professor and author.

Education and career Thring was born in Melbourne, Australia, but moved to England when he was four years old. In the same book he describes domestic and gardening tools, Intermediate Technology for less developed countries and robots to take the place of people in dangerous situations. However, these were not just imagining. At the University of Sheffield and Queen Mary College he was actively involved in robotics. He produced a stair-climbing robot, an autonomous fire-fighting robot, and one for clearing a table. After his retirement he founded a charity called Power Aid to help developing countries. In 1969 he predicted a future in which factories would be largely automatic, controlled by a central computer, and supposed that this would reduce the human working week to 10 or 20 hours.

He studied combustion and other forms of energy generation, and was one of the founders of the International Flame Research Foundation.

Books The domestic open fire: a survey of research prior to 1937 M.W. Thring (London : Combustion Appliance Makers' Assn.) 1938. The influence of port design on open-hearth furnace flames J.H. Chesters & M.W. Thring (London : Iron and Steel Institute) 1946. Air Pollution. Based on papers given at a conference held at the University of Sheffield, September 1956. Edited by M. W. Thring (London: Butterworths Scientific Publications) 1957 Pilot plants, models, and scale-up methods in chemical engineering R. E. Johnstone & M. W. Thring (New York : McGraw-Hill) 1957. The science of flames and furnaces M.W. Thring (London, Chapman & Hall) 1952. Nuclear propulsion edited by M.W. Thring (London : Butterworths) 1960. Pulsating combustion : the collected works of F.H. Reynst edited by M.W. Thring (Oxford : Pergamon) 1961. The science of flames and furnaces, 2nd edition M.W. Thring (London, Chapman & Hall) 1962. The principles of applied science M. W. Thring (Oxford, Pergamon) 1964. Engineering: An outline for the intending student M. W. Thring, 1972 Man, machines and tomorrow M.W. Thring, 1973 Energy and Humanity M. W. Thring & R. J. Crookes, 1974 Machines, masters or slaves of man? M.W. Thring, 1974, Strategy for Energy M. W. Thring, 1975 How to invent M.W. Thring, 1977. The engineer's conscience M.W. Thring & E. R. Laithwaite, 1980 Robots and telechirs : manipulators with memory, remote manipulators, machine limbs for the handicapped M.W. Thring, 1983 Quotations from G.I.Gurdjieff's Teaching: A Personal Companion M. W. Thring, 1998

Patents British Patents GB Patent 535576 (1941) Gas producers GB Patent 549142 (1942) Refractory material GB Patent 553753 (1943) Electrostatic gas cleaner GB Patent 572380 (1945) Crucible and the like furnaces GB Patent 579324 (1946) Combustion of solid fuel GB Patent 579823 (1946) Carbonization of coal and combustion of the carbonised residue GB Patent 587821 (1947) Transportable heating unit GB Patent 587823 (1947) Controlling the air supply in furnaces and like heating appliances GB Patent 610950 (1948) Recording gas constituents GB Patent 760430 (1956) Control of combustion processes GB Patent 803528 (1958) Smoke-consuming domestic stoves GB Patent 818718 (1959) Rotary regenerative heat exchangers GB Patent 842024 (1960) Utilising the waste heat of furnace gases and in cleansing thereof GB Patent 870446 (1961) The generation of electricity GB Patent 877779 (1961) Devices to facilitate the lighting of domestic fires GB Patent 895534 (1962) Electric-arc steel furnaces GB Patent 896639 (1962) Open-hearth furnaces GB Patent 985625 (1965) Continuous casting of metals GB Patent 1023817 (1966) Sampling and analysis of steel GB Patent 1127443 (1968) Fire detection and fighting apparatus GB Patent 1111869 (1968) Continuous steel-making GB Patent 1131233 (1968) Automatic equipment for detecting fires GB Patent 2167542 (1986) Furnace for industrial waste

US Patents US Patent 2515545 (1950) Controlling the combustion rate and composition of the combustion gases in the burning of coal US Patent 2663272 (1953) Controlling the air supply in furnaces and like heating appliances US Patent 3171877 (1965) Apparatus for Continuous Steel Making US Patent 3201622 (1965) Generation of Electricity US Patent 3312230 (1967) Dish-Washing Machines US Patent 3522859 (1970) Walking Machine US Patent 3764667 (1973) Process for producing pigment-quality titanium dioxide