TELFER

UNITED KINGDOM (see also List of Individuals)

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31.5.1897 Hartlepool/UK - 15.1.1977 Epsom/UK

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Edmund Victor Telfer received practical experience in several British shipyards before going to college. He was a graduate in mechanical engineering of Armstrong College, Durham University in 1920. A distinction in naval architecture led to a Scholarship and the beginning of a lifetime of pioneering on the resistance and propulsion of ships. Telfer held several degrees, among them a PhD in naval architecture from 1927 - the first ever granted.

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While still a young man, Telfer's work attracted the attention of experiment tank experts of the day, as well as a North East Coast Institution Shipbuilding Gold Medal, and eventually revolutionized the presentation and extrapolation of model data. Telfer was instrumental in founding the International Conference of Ship Tank Superintendents, later the International Towing Tank Conference. He invented the Duplex rudder and the successful Heliston propeller. During World War II he was responsible for the Seadrome and other naval marine projects. In the following years he returned to the academic world as a professor teaching in such places as Istanbul, Turkey and Poona in India. Then, in 1951, he became professor of naval engineering at the Technical University of Trondheim, Norway, where he acquired a rare reputation for inspiring the students to think and take a real interest in their subject, until he "retired" back to his active consultancy at the age of 70. During his 50 years' career as an internationally prominent naval architect, Telfer presented a number of outstanding papers mainly on the resistance problem of ships and hydraulic similitude in naval engineering. He was elected an Honorary Member of the Society of Naval Architects and Marine Engineers in 1976. He was a vice-president of the Institution of Naval Architects from 1955 to 1963 and an Honorary President from then to his death. He was also presented in 1976 the Froude Medal for his achievements in naval architecture.

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_{Anonymous (1977). Edmund V. Telfer. Society Naval Architects and Marine Engineers 85: 510. Anonymous (1977). Prof. Edmund Victor Telfer, PhD. Trans. Institution of Naval Architects 119: lxvi-lxvii. P}

_{Haver, A.H., Telfer, E.V. (1925). The propulsive performance of the corrugated ship. Trans. Institution Naval Architects 67: 331-359.}

_{Telfer, E.V. (1927). Ship resistance similarity. The Shipbuilder 34(5): 247-255. P; also in Trans. Institution of Naval Architects 69: 174-190.}

_{Telfer, E.V. (1950). Frictional resistance and ship-resistance similarity. The Shipbuilder and Marine Engine-Builder 57(4): 282-288.}