Richard Coyle - Life Member
31 May 1922 – 18 Jan 2014
Dick Coyle was one of the founding fathers of the Australian X-ray Analytical Association. Dick, from Melbourne, and fellow AXAA Life Member Vince Manners, from Sydney, are remembered as the two tyros who established strong AXAA branches in their respective States.
Progressively over his working career, Dick became an internationally recognised X-ray diffractionist. He was widely regarded as the foremost Australian expert on residual stress assessments of engineering components, such as aircraft parts. He was known especially for his expertise in equipment development, not being one for buying analytical equipment off-the-shelf.
As a young man, Dick commenced studies in Applied Science at Melbourne Technical College (later to be RMIT University), but these were interrupted by World War II. He joined the Royal Australian Navy and served as an officer in New Guinea waters on HMAS Manoora. Subsequently, he graduated from Melbourne Technical College with a Fellowship Diploma.
After the war, Dick joined the Division of Tribophysics, CSIRO, Carlton where he built instruments for metallurgical research. He then moved to the Munitions Supply Laboratory, Maribyrnong, where he designed and operated X-ray diffraction equipment for materials research and identification. Next came a very productive period at the British National Physical Laboratory, Teddington, UK where he asembled one of the first modern computers and an X-ray diffractometer for the study of metallic solid solutions.
On his return to Australia, Dick joined the Aeronautical Research Laboratory (ARL), Fishermans Bend, specialising in X-ray diffraction evaluation of aircraft instrumentation. With B. E. Williams he co-authored “Demonstrating X-ray diffraction”, a training text for non-specialist users. At ARL, he studied metal fatigue, fibre patching of metals and carbon fibre technology, and worked on seatbelt design. Later he moved to the Physics Department at Monash University where he remained until his retirement, focussing on the use of X-ray diffraction in stress and texture assessments. His time at Monash included a productive collaboration with Rod Clapp of Diffraction Technology on the automation of residual stress and texture measurements. Dick’s excellence in X-ray analytical science is gauged by his authorship of some 50 publications, on which basis Dick was awarded a RMIT University masters degree by research.
The Australian X-ray Analytical Association (AXAA) was formed in the early 1970s and from those early days Dick was a strong contributor, both at conferences and as an office bearer, the latter at both State and National levels. An account of the Fifth Australasian Schools and Conference (Victorian Pharmacy College, 1983) notes that R .A. Coyle won the Rockwell prize for a new automated drive to a microdensitometer.
The awards received by Dick included AXAA Life membership and the Florence Taylor Medal
awarded by the Australian Institute of Metals. He was a founding member of AXAA, the Australian Institute of Physics, and the Society of Crystallographers in Australia. On retirement from Monash in 1986, Dick became an honorary research fellow in the Physics Department, and he also contributed to restoration of the WW2 naval corvette HMAS Castlemaine, which is moored at Williamstown.
Those who were fortunate to work with Dick valued greatly his sense of fairness, his warmth and wry humour; criticism of others was non-existent except for his intolerance of pomposity. His trademark comment on ‘experts’ was a classic - ''X being the unknown substance while 'spurt' is a drip under pressure''. Dick rarely talked about the breadth of his rich life beyond X-rays, Few, for example, few were aware that in his youth he had been a prominent athlete, being a nationally ranked walker.
Above all, he was devoted to his wife Ruth and their large family, as well as their grandchildren. Ruth accompanied Dick to many AXAA functions. The essence of the man is evident from the loving obituary crafted for the Melbourne Age by his family.
His legacy for many is very considerable.
Dick Coyle was one of the founding fathers of the Australian X-ray Analytical Association. Dick, from Melbourne, and fellow AXAA Life Member Vince Manners, from Sydney, are remembered as the two tyros who established strong AXAA branches in their respective States.
Progressively over his working career, Dick became an internationally recognised X-ray diffractionist. He was widely regarded as the foremost Australian expert on residual stress assessments of engineering components, such as aircraft parts. He was known especially for his expertise in equipment development, not being one for buying analytical equipment off-the-shelf.
As a young man, Dick commenced studies in Applied Science at Melbourne Technical College (later to be RMIT University), but these were interrupted by World War II. He joined the Royal Australian Navy and served as an officer in New Guinea waters on HMAS Manoora. Subsequently, he graduated from Melbourne Technical College with a Fellowship Diploma.
After the war, Dick joined the Division of Tribophysics, CSIRO, Carlton where he built instruments for metallurgical research. He then moved to the Munitions Supply Laboratory, Maribyrnong, where he designed and operated X-ray diffraction equipment for materials research and identification. Next came a very productive period at the British National Physical Laboratory, Teddington, UK where he asembled one of the first modern computers and an X-ray diffractometer for the study of metallic solid solutions.
On his return to Australia, Dick joined the Aeronautical Research Laboratory (ARL), Fishermans Bend, specialising in X-ray diffraction evaluation of aircraft instrumentation. With B. E. Williams he co-authored “Demonstrating X-ray diffraction”, a training text for non-specialist users. At ARL, he studied metal fatigue, fibre patching of metals and carbon fibre technology, and worked on seatbelt design. Later he moved to the Physics Department at Monash University where he remained until his retirement, focussing on the use of X-ray diffraction in stress and texture assessments. His time at Monash included a productive collaboration with Rod Clapp of Diffraction Technology on the automation of residual stress and texture measurements. Dick’s excellence in X-ray analytical science is gauged by his authorship of some 50 publications, on which basis Dick was awarded a RMIT University masters degree by research.
The Australian X-ray Analytical Association (AXAA) was formed in the early 1970s and from those early days Dick was a strong contributor, both at conferences and as an office bearer, the latter at both State and National levels. An account of the Fifth Australasian Schools and Conference (Victorian Pharmacy College, 1983) notes that R .A. Coyle won the Rockwell prize for a new automated drive to a microdensitometer.
The awards received by Dick included AXAA Life membership and the Florence Taylor Medal
awarded by the Australian Institute of Metals. He was a founding member of AXAA, the Australian Institute of Physics, and the Society of Crystallographers in Australia. On retirement from Monash in 1986, Dick became an honorary research fellow in the Physics Department, and he also contributed to restoration of the WW2 naval corvette HMAS Castlemaine, which is moored at Williamstown.
Those who were fortunate to work with Dick valued greatly his sense of fairness, his warmth and wry humour; criticism of others was non-existent except for his intolerance of pomposity. His trademark comment on ‘experts’ was a classic - ''X being the unknown substance while 'spurt' is a drip under pressure''. Dick rarely talked about the breadth of his rich life beyond X-rays, Few, for example, few were aware that in his youth he had been a prominent athlete, being a nationally ranked walker.
Above all, he was devoted to his wife Ruth and their large family, as well as their grandchildren. Ruth accompanied Dick to many AXAA functions. The essence of the man is evident from the loving obituary crafted for the Melbourne Age by his family.
His legacy for many is very considerable.