During 1962 Professor E J Richards, the then Head of the Department of Aeronautics, was finalising arrangements for the establishment of the now internationally renowned Institute of Sound and Vibration Research (ISVR). With his retirement from the Department of Electronics pending, Eric Zepler was approached by Professor Richards to consider joining this new Institute as a Research Fellow to ‘provide essential mechanical and electronic backup to a group studying human responses to noise and vibration, including amongst other factors those induced by impulsive noise’.

Although this subject was not within his recognised fields of research interest he was nevertheless intrigued by the challenge and with the additional encouragement of Professor POAL Davies joined as one of the first newly appointed members of staff in October 1963. Working on a morning only basis he started out on a most successful new career, in what can only be described as modest accommodation for such an esteemed professor. He was sharing a room in the basement of the Tizard Building with a lecturer and a research student when I joined this small team as a Research Fellow in January 1964. Together we started on a ten year working collaboration which resulted, as those who have ever been closely associated with him will testify, in not only a stimulating research experience but also a personal friendship to be treasured.

As the research in audiology and subjective acoustics expanded the group was relocated in houses in University Road whilst three floors and custom build acoustic laboratories were added to the Tizard Building. It was in these environments that Eric Zepler developed his original research contributions and supervised many PhD students. A laboratory in the Rayleigh Building was subsequently named after him.

In the following pages I have written about his work on Sonic Boom Research and on Community Noise and Vibration Research, and also about “Zepler the Person”. Also I have included some memories of him as a research supervisor, written by Professors Roger Thornton and Michael Griffin.