Book review: Exactly – How precision engineers created the modern world
Here is another excellent book from author Simon Winchester. Simon has written numerous books on history, geography, inventions, discovery and personalities, the Library service has thirteen titles available and every one riveting reading. ‘Exactly’ is the latest.
Exactly illustrates how all the advances since the industrial revolution were based on advances in precision engineering. Each chapter takes the reader through a history changing engineering event commencing with the eighteenth century engineer John Wilkinson whose boring a cylinder from solid iron for James Watt’s steam engine is considered the world’s first case of precision engineering.
At four hundred pages this is a substantial book, it is divided into eleven chapters each dealing with a definite step forward in precision engineering and the advantages this bought.
We are told about Joseph Whitworth, who standardisation of the sizes of screws, nuts bolts, cogs and measures resulted in hugely improved productivity. This Standardisation resulted in cheaper production of parts allowing for once expensive items, such as clocks, becoming affordable for the masses.
Chapters told of how precision engineering or parts allowed Henry Ford to develop the mass production of cars, of Frank Whittle’s design of the jet engine, of Kintari Hattori’s Seiko watches and Leica lenses.
There are some interesting characters portrayed along the way. Eighteenth century Frenchman Honoré Blanc, who on one hand advanced society by designing a secure lock which could be mass produced and on the other also designed a rifle which was both more reliable and could be mass produced which made war much more lethal.
And so from steam power through to space travel where Ultra precision has been necessary for survival and the development of GPS and the multitude of advantages this brings.
A chapter covers the current ultimate precision , a devise called LIGO which can measure such as microscopic changes in the earth’s gravitational pull, or reflect light to one ten-thousandth of the diameter of a proton, or even the distance to our neighbour star Alpha Centauri ,which is 26 trillion miles, to within the width of a single human hair. Now that is precision.
Along with imparting knowledge Simon Winchester explores fundamental questions on the importance of precision and the various tools that are used to measure it. And can the precise and the natural co-exist in society? Exactly is a fascinating journey through history which I thoroughly enjoyed.
Mike Beckett
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