Heavy Electrical Manufacturing

Heavy Electrical Engineering was dominated by GEC. I explore the story of this massive company from merger with AEI and English Electric, growth through Marconi and Plessey and joint ventures with Thorn, General Electric of the USA, Alsthom of France and Siemens of Germany. The company was fatally wounded by the crash following the dot com boom and I trace its break up. There is a vital link to power and power generation and I explore the competitor grouping of Northern Engineering Industries and also its demise. They were not alone, Brush and Crompton Parkinson, subsidiaries of Hawker Siddeley were important players. Rolls-Royce had had a place in power engineering since the fifties when its nuclear business powered British submarines. It may be that Rolls-Royce will emerge strongly with its small nuclear reactors. It is interesting how the German Siemens has taken a good deal of British manufacturing into its ownership.

The images is of the Brush Falcon Works in Loughborough

Return to Vehicles to Vaccines page

You can read more in Vehicles to Vaccines

From gypsum to granite

My journey began near to where Gypsum is mined in Leicestershire by British Gypsum now owned by the French St Gobain. My destination was Penmaenmawr overlooking Anglesey where some of the finest granite was quarried. En route I passed some icons of British Manufacturing. First came Rolls-Royce in Derby with the history of the WW2 […]

A sixteenth century mechanised mint in Segovia

Coins were traditionally minted by a stamp and hammer, and indeed had been in Segovia since Roman times. The invading Spanish discovered vast quantities of silver at Potosi in Peru in the late sixteenth century and mined it using first local slave labour and then, when mining killed them, slaves from Africa. The bullion was […]

Where has all the money gone?

Gaby Hinsliff writing in the Guardian observed with sadness that those little treats enjoyed by middle earners are becoming less affordable. I pondered why this might be. My mind turned to the larger stage of public expenditure and I see much the same picture as I have observed before. Schools are squeezed so PTAs have […]

The genius of Roman hydraulic engineering

In the First Century CE, the Romans brought fresh water to the city of Segovia over a distance of fifteen km from the Sierra de Guadarrama mountain range. The first thirteen km are underground in a stone and concrete duct, but then it enters the city in this channel in what is first a low […]

Levelling Up – a layperson’s guide

In order the understand the concept and process of levelling up, it may be helpful to look at the reasons behind the un-levelness. Prosperity came to this country through trade and manufacturing. In the past few years I have been exploring the story of manufacturing, most recently manufacturing places. And therein I believe lies the […]