ROY BEWICK

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(originally published in the Spring 2010 newsletter of The Works) 

Imagine two huge engines, big enough to climb inside, driving a big wooden ship, a Navy mine sweeper.  Nothing on the ship, including the engine, can be magnetic, or it will set off the explosive mines.   So the engines are made of aluminum, which works, but they’re delicate, finicky.  The Navy is having trouble keeping them going. 

Roy Bewick, a young mechanical engineer fresh from officer training is put in charge.  “I did two things,” Roy recalls.  “I made sure that my crew had the instruction manual and a torque wrench in hand before they went to work.   And I made them proud to be there.”    Roy and his team get the engines running reliably, then soup them up.  Roy has the engine valve covers and air cleaners chrome plated, and polished.  His ship becomes the most reliable one in the squadron. His crew even rebuilds a damaged engine on the open sea, keeping the ship moving, in formation, using only one roaring engine.

Roy & wife Rosanna explore Transmissions

Looking back, Roy credits his grandfather, a railroad section chief, for instilling a love of machines and the pride of a thorough job.  His father and teachers encouraged him too. “In those days we were taught that we were masters of the universe.  That we could – that it was our responsibility to – remake the world to make it better.”   

After the Navy, Roy worked for 3M for 31 years.  One of his favorite achievements there was building a factory in Italy to manufacture the polyester film used for magnetic tapes and X-ray films.  Roy’s staff designed and built custom machines longer than a basketball court to extrude and stretch molten chemicals into giant sheets of clear plastic, thinner than a human hair. 

Now retired and living in Italy, Roy builds elegant and rugged mechanical exhibits for The Works, including the popular Simple Transmission and the reversing Dog Clutch.  He just brought us a new exhibit on Gear Trains; come visit The Works to see what that means! 

What drives him?  “It’s the satisfaction of seeing something emerge from a block of metal, or a pile of parts.”   Plus the pride of a master engineer in making something work, then improving it.  “The best thing I ever built, if I did it again, I’d do it better. “  Roy grins. “That’s the challenge, that’s what makes engineering fun.”  

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