STANDARDS, Bureau of, a subdivision of the Department of Commerce of the United States, authorized to deal with standards of measurement, standard values of constants, standards of quality, standards of mechanical performance and standards of practice. Its testing laboratories are located at Washington, D. C. The bureau occupies somewhat the same position with respect to the manufacturing interests of the country that the bureaus of the Department of Agriculture do to the agri cultural interests. Its work calls for con tinuous scientific and technical investigations of the highest grade. It compares with its own standards of measurement the standards or measuring instruments of States, cities, scientific laboratories, educational institutions, manufac turers, government bureaus or the public, for which a nominal fee is charged, except in the case of the National and State institutions. The bureau gives advice concerning these standards or their use, whether it be in con nection with the enactment of laws, regulations or ordinances concerning the weights and measures of everyday trade or in connection with precision standards used in scientific work and the industries. It gives advice upon re quest to State and city officials, public service commissions and public utility corporations re garding the standards of measurement, of quality or performance involved in legislation or regulation pertaining to public utilities. It also gives information to manufacturers in re gard to standards of measurement, how to use them, how to measure the properties of ma terials or as to the fundamental physical and chemical principles involved; also, how to initi ate and carry out scientific investigations and tests on their own account in their particular fields of work The staff of the bureau is or ganized according to the nature of the expert service involved. For example, the division of
weights and measures deals with all matters pertaining to standards of length, mass, time, density and similar questions; the division of heat and thermometry deals with heat stand ards, the testing of heat-measuring apparatus, the determination of heat constants and all in vestigations where heat measurement is the essential and predominating factor. The elec trical division is concerned similarly with the various electrical standards of measurement, the electrical properties of materials or the per formance of electrical equipment. Similarly the work of the optical and chemistry divisions deals with the standards and questions arising in connection with these subjects. The struc tural engineering and miscellaneous materials division deals with the investigation, testing and preparation of specifications for these ma terials, such as the metals and their alloys, stone, cement, concrete, lime, clay, clay products, paints, oils, paper textiles, rubber and other miscellaneous materials. Its work has greatly expanded and now ranges from the measure ment of the radiation of stars to a study of the efficiency and capacity of a vacuum cleaner. After the outbreak of the European War in 1914 the most interesting work of the bureau was that of helping manufacturers to produce at home and out of American materials products for which before they had been dependent upon foreign supplies. Its most notable successes in this field were in the paper and porcelain in dustries.
In 1915 the total appropriation for this bureau amounted to $695,811.33. Consult An nual Report of the Director, Bureau of Stand ards (Washington), and publications upon definite subjects issued by the bureau from time to time.