Ship builder's machine 'shop

[Crispin]

While this might be old news to some of the older folk here (or Gav ), I find these fascinating
http://www.shipsnostalgia.com/guides/Wi ... d_and_Sons

See the lathe for the crank!

 

[Chris]

I wish I could say something clever about England's might and how it all went into decline. But I can't. Progress is inevitable, but just think about the skill involved in making something like that. That's proper, that is.

It brings back memories of the smell of machine shops to me. Very distinctive. All that coolant and hot motors.

Mind you CNC machines are like watching ballet sometimes.

Just wish I had my lathe. Maybe next year if I extend the garage. Not big enough for a ship's engine perhaps.

C

 

[TonyP]

Thanks for that. I would have loved to have spent some time in a place like that as a kid. So facinating indeed! Sadly as you say Chris, those skills are long gone and lost

 

[Gav Peter]

I think you'll find most of those photographs came from Jay Dubbleyuh's garage...

Awesome - loved the flame cutting

Thats a serious hunk of metal!!!

 

[Jon Wildsmith]

Some pretty amazing machinery there. The cutter was one of my favorites too

 

[TonyP]

LOl I loved that one too, was looking at that and thinking mind your toes when the off-cut drops off, then I saw the supports

 

[Gav Peter]

The edges are supported - its the middle dropping out you need to be wary of!!!

 

[Crispin]

I recently went on a steam train trip which was a lot of fun. Before the trip we were walking around the shed where there were 9 or 10 strains in various states of refurbishment from having Dorris polishing the brass knobs (easy!) to Fred removing the wheels, pistons and bearings from an old beast of an engine. It was like porn heaven. Unfortunately we were short on time and I did not have a camera with me but you could spend hours in there talking to the guys, looking at all the different bits etc.

While it's not on the same scale, there was a lathe where they were finishing a drive wheel for a freight engine as well as various milling machines which would have filled your average home's bathroom

Day out anyone?

 

[Dave Docwra]

All done under strict "Health & Safety" standards..

 

[Ecoman]

All done under strict "Health & Safety" standards..

Thats exactly what I was thinking. Fantastic not to see hard hats, hi viz, ear protection, safety barriers, painted walk ways and the like.

Thats what a real machine shop is all about. Big bits of metal that go clang and floor sweepings you can shave with!

 

[Gav Peter]

Fantastic not to see hard hats

Have you not seen his flat cap Bill - the amount of grease & oil interwoven in that offers far superior protection to any bit of injection moulded plastic!!!

 

[Crispin]

I know 'eaf and safety has grown over the years to protect idiots from themselves (and there by polluting the gene pool) but in a shop like that, would there be a point of a hard hat or steel capped boots? I struggle to see anything that does not look like it would make you and your hard hat a well mixed gloop of stuff if it fell on you.

 

[joinerman]

Crispin, would that have been Quainton by any chance ?

 

[Ecoman]

Fantastic not to see hard hats

Have you not seen his flat cap Bill - the amount of grease & oil interwoven in that offers far superior protection to any bit of injection moulded plastic!!!

I agree Mr, but you know that the HSE boys would be crying in their herbal tea if they walked nto a shop like that.

A few years ago I had a laugh at our HSE attempts when I did some work over in Belgium at a plastics factory. In the UK on this particular IM machine we had big yellow barriers to stand behind, painted floors and a large heavy cage to close. Not to mention the copious amounts of PPE including hard hat, safety glasses, ear protection and steel toecap boots. On the same machine in Belgium there was no barrier or cage but there was a painted work area. The workers were walking round in trainers, overalls and were wearing ear plugs. I questioned their engineer and asked why the lack of safety kit and just laughed and said "if you are stupid enough to put your head inside the machine then you deserve to get hurt!" he then added that the process of closing cages and standing behind barriers slowed down production time by half. If you move the operators tools far enough away from the mechanism they would have a job to get trapped anyway. I then told him about the amount of PPE we had in the UK and he looked at me like I had 2 heads and said " You Brits must be softer than we thought. I can't see a plastic sauce bottle doing that much damage if it falls on your head let alone your foot. How the hell did you win both wars?!". That kept me chuckling for days

 

[Crispin]

Crispin, would that have been Quainton by any chance ?

Sorry, just seen this.

It was Loughborough Central Station. Very cool place

 

[Paul_Humphreys]

I liked the Milling machines, as I use to work on one the same in 1988!!

Paul