Robert Grimsey Cooper
Robert Grimsey Cooper (1903-1942)
1942 Obituary [1]
ROBERT GRIMSEY COOPER was well known for his work as chief designer to the Hydraulic Coupling and Engineering Company, Ltd., of Isleworth, for whom he carried out a considerable amount of the detail developments in the design of fluid couplings and torque converters. He contributed much in the way of valuable work and suggestions in the preparation of the papers on hydraulic couplings that were presented to the Institution in April 1935 and April 1938 by the undersigned, who wishes to record his grateful appreciation of the able part played by Mr. Cooper in the engineering development that is recorded in those papers since the year .1929. Mr. Cooper also visited the U.S.A. in connexion with the firm's business, to convey to the staff of an associated company experience gained in the design and application of hydraulic couplings. This visit laid the foundation stone of the wide and sound development of the hydraulic coupling that has taken place in the industrial and automobile fields in the United States.
Mr. Cooper, who was born in 1903, received his education at Harwich County School and Ipswich Technical School, and in 1919 he became an apprentice in the Ipswich works of Messrs. Reavell and Company, Ltd., serving for a period of five years, during which time he was chiefly engaged on the design and construction of air compressors. He was then transferred to the test and experimental department of the same firm, and in 1925 he joined Messrs. Blackstone and Company of Stamford, Lincs, as a test engineer and draughtsman in the centrifugal pump department.
A year later he was appointed senior draughtsman of the centrifugal and turbine pump department of Messrs. Worthington Simpson, Ltd., of Newark-on-Trent, with direct responsibility to the chief designer, and held this post until his appointment with the Hydraulic Coupling and Engineering Company upon its formation late in 1929.
Mr. Cooper was elected an Associate Member of the Institution in 1938, and his untimely death occurred on 19th August 1941, following a painful illness borne with great fortitude and cheerful devotion to his duties.