Price Subsurface Direction Meter
Price Subsurface Direction Meter
Previous
Next
Usage conditions apply
- Description
- William Gunn Price designed a water current meter in 1882, obtained a patent, and asked W. & L. E. Gurley, a large instrument firm in Troy, N.Y., to undertake commercial production. Price also designed an instrument that determined the direction the water flowed, but not its speed. This is an example of that instrument. It is 33 inches long and may date from the late 1880s. It has a four-blade rudder that is counterbalanced by a heavy iron ball (5-inch diameter; 7-inch including flanges); inside the ball there is a magnetic compass marked, on its face, “W. & L. E. Gurley, Troy, N.Y.” The “U.S.C. & G.S. No. 13” inscription indicates that this example was used by U.S. Coast and Geodetic Survey. The National Bureau of Standards, the organization that calibrated current meters for federal agencies and engineers in private practice, transferred it to the Smithsonian in 1959.
- Ref: Arthur H. Frazier, William Gunn Price and the Price Current Meters (Washington, D.C., 1967).
- Arthur H. Frazier, Water Current Meters in the Smithsonian Collections of the National Museum of History and Technology (Washington, D.C., 1974), p. 81.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Object Name
- subsurface direction meter
- Measurements
- overall: 33 in; x 83.82 cm
- overall: 6 in x 34 3/4 in x 8 in; 15.24 cm x 88.265 cm x 20.32 cm
- ID Number
- PH.316592
- accession number
- 225869
- catalog number
- 316592
- Credit Line
- National Bureau of Standards
- See more items in
- Medicine and Science: Physical Sciences
- Measuring & Mapping
- Water Currents
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
Nominate this object for photography.
Our collection database is a work in progress. We may update this record based on further research and review. Learn more about our approach to sharing our collection online.
If you would like to know how you can use content on this page, see the Smithsonian's Terms of Use. If you need to request an image for publication or other use, please visit Rights and Reproductions.
