Diarmuid Downs
{{Short description|British automotive engineer}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=February 2025}}
{{Use British English|date=April 2018}}
{{Infobox officeholder
| honorific_prefix =
| name = Sir Diarmuid Downs
| honorific_suffix = {{postnominals|country=GBR|size=100%|CBE|KSG|FRS|FREng|FIMechE}}
| image =
| alt =
| caption =
| office = Managing Director, Ricardo Consulting Engineers
| term_start = 1967
| term_end = 1984
| birth_name =
| birth_date = 23 April 1922
| birth_place = London, England
| death_date = {{Death date and age|2014|02|12|1922|04|23|df=yes}}
| death_place =
| nationality =
| other_names =
| occupation =
| years_active =
| known_for =
| notable_works =
}}
Sir Diarmuid Downs (23 April 1922 – 12 February 2014{{cite news|title=Sir Diarmuid Cbe Frs Downs|url=http://www.theargus.co.uk/announcements/deaths/deaths/11017298.Sir_Diarmuid_CBE_FRS_DOWNS/|access-date=19 February 2014|newspaper=The Argus|date=18 February 2012}}) was a British automotive engineer.
Early life
Downs was born in 1922 in London, where his father ran a small engineering business manufacturing equipment for the oil industry. Downs was educated at Gunnersbury Catholic Grammar School and the Regent Street Polytechnic, London.{{Cite web|url=http://heritage.imeche.org/historyimeche/pastpresidents/president/SirDiarmuidDowns.htm|title = Engineering Heritage Awards – IMechE}} He then studied at Northampton Engineering College, London, where he graduated with First Class honours in 1942. He won a postgraduate bursary for further research and study, which he took up with Ricardo and Co.
Career
For his first 15 years with Ricardo & Co., first as student, then as a member of staff, and from 1947 as Head of the Petrol Engine Department, Downs pursued a study of fundamental study of abnormal combustion phenomena in the petrol engine, resulting in a clearer understanding of the problems of knock and pre-ignition.
Downs was made a Director of Ricardo in 1957. He was made managing director ten years later, remaining in this position until 1984. He was chairman of the company from 1976 to 1987.Ricardo Consulting Engineers
Downs served as President of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers in 1978 and as President of FISITA, the International Federation of Automotive Engineering Societies, from 1978 to 1980.International Federation of Automotive Engineering Societies He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1985.{{cite web | url= http://royalsociety.org/about-us/fellowship/fellows/|title= Fellows|publisher= Royal Society|access-date = 28 November 2010}} He was elected a Fellow{{cite web|title=List of Fellows|url=http://www.raeng.org.uk/about-us/people-council-committees/the-fellowship/list-of-fellows|access-date=16 October 2014|archive-date=8 June 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160608094405/http://www.raeng.org.uk/about-us/people-council-committees/the-fellowship/list-of-fellows|url-status=dead}} for the Royal Academy of Engineering.{{cite web|title=List of Fellows|url=http://www.raeng.org.uk/about-us/people-council-committees/the-fellowship/list-of-fellows|access-date=16 October 2014|archive-date=8 June 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160608094405/http://www.raeng.org.uk/about-us/people-council-committees/the-fellowship/list-of-fellows|url-status=dead}}
More details can be found in the Bibliographical Memoirs of Fellows of The Royal Society published in 2019.{{Cite journal|last=Morrison|first=David|date=2019|title=Sir Diarmuid Downs CBE. 23 April 1922 – 12 February 2014|journal=Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society|volume=66|pages=159–181|doi=10.1098/rsbm.2018.0036|doi-access=free}}
References
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{{s-bef|before=Hugh Ford }}
{{s-ttl|title=President of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers |years=1978 }}
{{s-aft|after= James Gordon Dawson }}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Downs, Diarmuid}}
Category:Engineers from London
Category:British automotive engineers
Category:English Roman Catholics
Category:Commanders of the Order of the British Empire
Category:Presidents of the Smeatonian Society of Civil Engineers
Category:Fellows of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers
Category:Fellows of the Royal Society
Category:Knights of St. Gregory the Great