Busy Pipe

An ordinary one-inch copper pipe, says Professor Harold Barlow of University College in London, can be tricked into carrying 1) a heavy load of power, 2) 2,000 telephone messages, and 3) 20 distinct television programs--and all at the same time.

Dr. Barlow, wartime head of the R.A.F.'s radio research station at Farnborough, is now considered Britain's leading authority on microwaves. He has found that waves 8.6 mm. long (40,000 megacycles) can be forced to travel long distances, with very little loss, through the kind of copper pipe that plumbers use.

In Dr. Barlow's system, the 8.6 mm. waves will stick to the inside of the pipe. On the outside surface travel somewhat longer waves (10,000 megacycles). If properly started on their journeys, the two sets of waves will not bother one another. The metal of the pipe can carry electric power, and neither the inside nor outside waves will interfere with it.

Dr. Barlow believes that plain copper pipe can replace multiwire telephone cables as well as coaxial television cables (copper tubes with insulated copper cores). It is much cheaper than either of them. Chief remaining obstacle is the high cost of the magnetron tubes that must be used in its repeater stations, but he thinks their price can be cut down by large-scale manufacture.

The British Electricity Authority and the Post Office (which runs Britain's telephone system) are both interested in Dr. Barlow's copper pipes. One promising use: to bring electric power, television and chitchat across the Channel from France.

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