ABSTRACT
JOHNSON R.D. 09.01. 1874 Orchard Park NY/USA 28.06. 1949 Fort Lauderdale FL/USA Raymond Deloraine Johnson obtained the ME degree from Cornell University in 1901. He was research engineer of Shawinigan Water & Power Company, Shawinigan Falls QC, until 1902, from where he moved as a hydraulic engineer to the Ontario Power Company, Niagara Falls. From 1908 Johnson was a hydraulic engineer of the New York State Water Power Commission, Albany NY, until becoming from 1914 to 1936 private consultant in New York City. He was a member of the American Society of Civil Engineers, and the recipient of the 1922 Elliot Cresson Gold Medal for meritorious inventions from the Franklin Institute for his pioneering works in hydraulic engineering. He was also awarded the 1947 Holley Medal from ASME. Johnson’s name is closely related with the surge tank, a term applied to a stand pipe or storage reservoir placed at the downstream end of a closed pipeline system to prevent undue pressure oscillations if discharge is suddenly reduced or increased. Surge tanks are a main element of all connections between reservoirs and turbines for hydro-electric power generation, because such an installation has to flexibly adapt to changes of users. Without a surge tank, such a scheme would either immediately fail, or the pipelines would be so massive that their cost would be highly excessive. Johnson proposed the differential surge tank as an improved version of the simple surge tank consisting only of the vertical stand pipe, as compared with a system of two or more tanks connected normally by overfall structures, to take up excessive discharge from the entire scheme, thus preventing the above mentioned pressure head oscillations. In the 1917 paper Johnson considered surges as appear on free surface channels, again due to a variation of typically the discharge at either channel end. These waves were originally investigated by Henry Bazin (1829-1917), providing information on the main wave characteristics. Anonymous (1937). Johnson, Raymond D. Who’s who in engineering 4: 715. Lewis: New York. Anonymous (1948). Raymond D. Johnson: Holley Medal. Mechanical Engineering 70(1): 68. P Anonymous (1949). Raymond D. Johnson. Engineering News-Record 143(Jul.14): 67. Anonymous (1949). Raymond D. Johnson. Mechanical Engineering 71(9): 798. Jaeger, C. (1977). Fluid transients in hydro-electric engineering practice. Blackie: Glasgow UK. Johnson, R.D. (1908). The surge tank in water power plants. Trans. ASME 30: 443-474. Johnson, R.D. (1915). The differential surge tank. Trans. ASCE 78: 760-805. Johnson, R.D. (1917). Surges in an open canal. Trans. ASCE 81: 112-124.
