ROCHDALE ENGINE MAKERS

[Stanley]

Transcript of a document found in the Whitelees engine house at Holcroft foundry in 1988 by Stanley Graham when he was moving the engine out prior to installing it at Ellenroad.


STEAM ENGINE BUILDING IN ROCHDALE.

By G B Williamson. M.I.Mech.E. Read, 19th November 1943.

This paper was prompted partly by the address given by our president in 1941 on ‘The Beginning and Progress of Electrical Engineering in Rochdale’, and partly by the desire to put on record, before evidence vanishes and memory fades, the story of another notable phase in local industrial development.

This desire was somewhat frustrated by reconstruction and transfer of businesses, absence of sentiment in the evaluation of old books and papers and inevitable wastage wrought by time which left many matters of human interest tantalisingly vague.

For our present purpose we must resist the temptation to quote ancient history, from 150 BC when steam as an agent of power is first mentioned, to the beginning of the 18th century when it first became a real power in the land. In the first half of that century, practically all the industries which exist today had their beginnings, but it was mining, in it’s various activities which provided the real incentive to steam. The first working steam engine was constructed in Devonshire by Thomas Savery, and between 1708 and 1714 many of his engines were erected in Cornwall. These were little more than steam bottles, on the principle that many years later was applied to the pumping apparatus called the pulsometer, and they were exceedingly wasteful of steam.

No real progress was made until Newcomen and Calley, of Dartmouth, took the matter in hand, and although they erected their first engine, in 1712, at Wolverhampton [At Dudley. SCG.] progress was very slow, as for thirty years afterwards, there was only one engine at work in the whole of Cornwall where the need for powerful mine pumps was the greatest. Thereafter, by dint of close study and development by engineers of the calibre of Brindley and Smeaton, progress was more rapid and by 1775 when James Watt discovered the secret of economy in the use of steam, engines of the Newcomen or so-called atmospheric type were at work in Staffordshire, Yorkshire, Northumberland and Lancashire. They were all of the beam type, non-rotative, with the cylinder at one end of the beam and the pump plunger at the other. Steam of little more than household kettle pressure was admitted below the piston so allowing the plunger at the other end of the beam to descend and water to fill the pump barrel. When the upward stroke of the piston was completed, steam was cut off and cold water was sprayed all over the cylinder thus condensing the steam and creating a vacuum below the piston. The pressure of the atmosphere above it then caused the piston to descend thus lifting the plunger at the other end and discharging the water from the barrel. It was a crude and wasteful arrangement but it worked long and with fair reliability. It is more than probable that the earliest engine which we have any mention of in the district, erected at Smallbridge Colliery in 1787 was of this type but no details of the engine are known. Wherever, at that time, steam power had been applied to driving machinery it was by pumping water to a higher level reservoir and then using it on a water wheel in a closed circuit. Horses, often working in relays and straight water power were the alternatives open to other than hand operated mills and the reason for erecting the earliest power driven mills in Rochdale by the river weirs at Holland Street and Oakenrod will be readily understood.

The steam engine as we know it begins with the improvements effected by James Watt, who, by the way, never claimed to be the inventor of the steam engine. Watt established the cardinal principle that the cylinder should be kept at least as hot as the steam that entered it, so he transferred the process of condensation to a separate vessel, made the engine double-acting, provided regulation in the form of the fly-ball governor, not in itself an original device, and whilst retaining the rocking beam, provided for rotary motion. Thus he established the prime mover known as the beam engine which, for well over a hundred years, was installed in the mills of industrial England and many countries abroad.

I have gone to some pains to trace the earliest rotary engines in the district and the first reliable record is of an engine made in 1797 for the firm of John Taylor and Son (or James Taylor and John Taylor) who then worked Hanging Road Mill. This engine was made by the world famous firm of Boulton and Watt of Birmingham. The cylinder was 16” bore and the stroke 4ft with a nominal horse power of 8 and some of the original drawings are in existence carefully preserved in the Boulton and Watt collection in Birmingham. This engine had a wooden beam and connecting rod, wooden framework and sun and planet gear for obtaining rotary motion. This gear, which incidentally gave two revolutions of the flywheel for one revolution of the planet wheel, was adopted by Watt in order to evade the patent which had been granted to one Pickard, for the obvious and simple crank. By 1804, Boulton and Watt had supplied two engines, one of 36hp with a stroke of 6ft and a second engine of 20hp, for the Hanging Road Mill. This later engine had a cast iron connecting rod but the beam was still of wood.

In 1816 there were only seven steam engines in the town area, viz., two at Hanging Road and others at College Street, Mill Street, Entwisle Place (now Whitehall Street), Townhead and Greenbank. Those at Hanging Road and Greenbank at least were made by Boulton and Watt. One of the most interesting, and probably the most powerful, engines in the neighbourhood at this date was the beam pumping engine erected about 1802 at Hollingworth Lake for raising water from the lake via a three and a half mile channel to the summit level of the Rochdale Canal. No particulars of this engine are so far available but from the foundation work and the pump barrel which are still in position near Bear Hill House, and the relative levels, the author estimates the engine stroke at 8ft and the poser as that of 50 horses although a directory of 1818/20 refers to the engine as of 100hp. This engine ceased to work in 1887 but the tall engine house remained a local landmark until 1910.

In the year 1793, 30 years after Watt’s attention was first given to the use of steam and 18 years after his master patent, there came to Bury, to practice his family trade as an iron moulder and millwright, one Alexander Petrie. The family was of Lowland Scottish origin and had come down, through Cumberland, to Belfast and thence to Bury where Alexander arrived with a large family the youngest of whom was John, then 2 ½ years of age. In due course the boy John was apprenticed to his father’s trade and when he finished his time, with no assets but native skill, a sound training and a persevering spirit he decided to commence business on his own account.

A great deal of work came into Bury from textile machine manufacturers in Rochdale where there were then at least six machine makers and, apparently, only one foundry. This foundry was owned by Benjamin Meanley and was between Packer Street and the House in the Wood, where now stands the town hall.

Young John Petrie had a look round and at the corner of High Street and Mill Street, just behind Cheetham Street he found a few old cottages which seemed to offer possibilities. He returned to Bury, discussed matters with his father who offered to loan the necessary funds for a start and the decision was taken. In a few months the party walls were knocked out, a sand bed made in the floor, a small cupola erected and in the year 1814 the name of Petrie, Ironfounder, enters local history. Within a short time of commencement it was obvious to his father, Alexander, that work which had been coming to Bury was going into young John’s foundry so he decided to join forces, the whole family came to Rochdale and the firm of Alexander Petrie and Company, Ironfounders was established.

For some years the business was that of a bench and lightweight casting foundry making stove and range castings and some of the smaller frame parts required by local machinists. They had no machine tools beyond a hand operated bench drill and it is rumoured that the blast fan was also worked by hand but a reputation was quickly won for sound craftsmanship. With the return of peace after 1815 confidence returned in some degree to the commercial world and mill building which had been suspended during the war resumed. Alexander Petrie and Company found it necessary to seek larger premises and in 1816 they moved to Whitehall Street where they built an equipped a new foundry and general engineering shop which they named after the works where John had served his apprenticeship, Phoenix Foundry. With the larger equipment now available they entered into the business of steam engine making. Here it may be as well to mention that, in contradiction of some local annals, Petrie’s were by no means the inventors or even introducers of the beam engine. They were, without question, the first makers of steam engines in Rochdale and preceded by many years some of the firms which, in Bolton, Manchester and other local areas became larger and probably more famous.

In 1819 Petries built there first steam engine of the Boulton and Watt beam type. It was a nominal 8hp and was made for James King of Leavegreave. Complete with boiler it cost £300. In 1820 they made a complete plant of 20hp for John Whitworth of Facit. By 1829 they had reached 50hp in a single unit made for Newalls of Littleborough who were amongst the pioneers of steam power in local mills. The following year, 1830, saw the first of nine engines made by Petries for the mills of Brights. This engine was 30hp and made for Jacob Bright’s first new mill at Fieldhouse, now known as the Back Mill. From 1809, Jacob Bright and Partners had been running Greenbank Mill which was built in 1903 and then contained a Boulton and Watt beam engine of 3hp similar to that made for Hanging Road in 1797.
Progress was gradula and in 1845 they built for the New Mills of John Bright and Brothers their magnum opus to that date, a magnificent pair of beam engines of 120hp combined the sight of which, at work, was one of the author’s earliest inspirations towards engineering. He never dreamt as he watched the stately oscillation of the two great beams and the majestic swing of the connecting rods over a stroke of 8ft in a setting of massive pillars and entablature grained to look like marble with carpeted staircases and planished steel brass rimmed casings to flywheel and cylinders, that one day they would come within his charge, but for a short time it happened so. These fine engines were designed by William McNaught who was superintendent of Phoenix Foundry at that time and he was always very proud of them.

In quoting horse power, particularly of Petrie made engines, we must note that up to 1898 the makers adhered to the old ‘Nominal’ horse power which dates back to James Watt and was based on very low pressure, never more than 5 or 6 pounds above the atmosphere, used and advocated by his firm. The actual and practically universal rating of ‘indicated’ horse power, abbreviated to IHP was from 3 to 6 times more than ‘nominal’ and as speeds and pressures increased and ‘McNaughting’ or compounding became general, the older figure became meaningless except as a rough indication of dimensional size. For instance, the engines last described were rated by the makers at 120hp but they actually developed over 700hp.

In 1847, a pair of engines identical in most respects with Bright’s New Mill set was exported to Russia thus beginning a connection with the continent which extended subsequently to Germany, Austria, Spain and Sweden. Overseas business is also recorded with Canada and New Zealand.

Although the beam engine was Petrie’s speciality for over 50 years and they were in other ways inclined to be conservative, particularly in their long adherence to the single cylinder principle and comparatively low pressure, they held to the last a reputation for sound workmanship and reliability. At least one engine of their make is now over 100 years old and still running. From about 1883 when they entered the thousand horse power class for the Crawford ‘A’ Mill, they kept fair pace with other makers in the adoption of new types. Triple expansion was adopted in 1893 for the Alpha Mill engines at Denton and in that year they converted the pair of beam engines at Brights Weaving Shed , which had run for twenty years at 40lb steam pressure, to a four cylinder triple expansion with 160psi on the boilers. In 1905 for the Marland Mill at Castleton they made their first triple expansion engine of the strictly marine type and in their closing years, 1908/09 they adopted a continental design with drop valves to all cylinders for the engine replacement at Mitchell Hey Shed.

During the 90 years of engine building at Phoenix Foundry there had been installed in the mills of Europe, under the Petrie nameplate, prime movers to a total of 80,000hp, and up to 2,000hp in a single unit, a record worth noting in local annals. But Petries were not the only local engine builders, and, in actual numbers of engines constructed pride of place must go to Thomas Robinson and Sons who, At Fishwick Street Works, between ? and 1913 made at least 900 engines, mostly of small sizes but of a wide variety of types, and for all parts of the world. Probably their largest unit was a 500hp cross compound engine made in 1889/90 for the weaving shed at Mitchell Hey. The author reckons the aggregate actual horse power of engines made at Fishwick Street as at least 20,000hp.
Among the makers of smaller units were Earnshaw, Barlow and Holt, William Todd, David Howarth, C&J Nuttall and Abraham Lord, but in larger engines from 1860 there was only one serious competitor of Petries and that was the firm established just before that year by William McNaught Senior.

This William McNaught was born in Manchester in 1811 being 20 years younger than John Petrie. He served an apprenticeship in Heywood and then left for a course of marine engineering with the famous firm Rennie of London, coming to Rochdale in 1838 when he was 27 years of age as chief designer and later, Superintendent, at Petries. He remained with them for twenty years during which period, either alone or in conjunction with Petries he invented and patented their earliest automatic expansion gear and governing arrangements. As already mentioned, he was the designer of the finest beam engines installed at Fieldhouse.

In 1860 we find him established in the old foundry at the junction of Drake Street and Oldham road then known as Halstead’s or Union Foundry, where wet rake Gardens are now, as a general engineer and millwright. For some time he confined himself to overhauls and repairs as he had little facility for engine building, but about 1862 he removed to much larger premises in Crawford Street which he named St George’s Foundry and where, at first, he specialised in engines of medium size and of the vertical type with the cylinder below the crankshaft, using the engine house wall as a vertical engine bed. The limitations of this arrangement were soon discovered and when William Senior retired in 1870 his two sons John and William, whose names now appeared as principles, commenced building the then standard horizontal compound engine. Their first mill sized job was for the Wham Bar Mill at Heywood which was started in 1874 but much larger engines for the new ‘Limiteds’ in the Oldham area quickly followed. In 1878 they supplied the engines for the Empress of India Mills in Bombay and during their 40 years of real activity from 1874 to 1914 they made 95 engines. During the same period Petries turned out 185 engines but the average horse power per engine was rather less than half of that recorded by McNaughts so the result for the period was a draw. We must not forget that Petries had a fairly steady business in steam boiler making which McNaught at least balanced in weight by a continuous output of machinery for washing and drying wool. Here, however, we enter delicate ground as there was another branch of the Petrie family then operating on the same lines in River Street.

Competition in this business, far removed from engine-building was stern indeed and embittered by much litigation, but now ‘the knights are dead, their spears are rust, their soul=s are with the Lord we trust.’ And the names of Petrie and McNaught are united in the present Crawford Street concern. John and William McNaught sent eight engines to India, and others to Poland, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Russia, Malta and Australia. Unlike Petries they made no beam engines, although they reconstructed and compounded a great many. Each firm had its own design of expansion gear and in such technical details there was keen rivalry. McNaughts were perhaps a little more willing to keep pace with advancing steam pressure and other developments and were advocating 80 to 100 pounds when Petries were content with 40 but each school of thought had notable adherents. Among McNaughts larger jobs were the 1800ihp triple expansion vertical marine type engines for the Arrow Mill at Castleton now running under Messrs Courtaulds.

Here we might try to clear away a misunderstanding which has prevailed in textile mill circles for nearly a century and still persists among engineers who should know better. This William McNaught of Rochdale was not the originator or inventor of the principle of compounding called McNaughting. The real inventor or rather the patentee, for the actual principle of compounding was known and put into practice at least 50 years earlier, was a cousin of our townsman and of the same name [John McNaught. Patent dated 1845. SCG.], practising at first in Glasgow and later in Manchester. Credit which he never claimed, has for generations been given to William McNaught just as the credit for the locomotive is widely and erroneously given to George Stephenson and to James Watt the credit for the invention of the steam engine, but it seems impossible for the truth to overtake these rumours.

The total horsepower turned out in engine by the McNaughts up to 1914, when to all practical purposes, engine building in Rochdale ceased, was 50,000. Among them the firms of Petrie, Robinson and McNaught had engined the industrial world to the extent of 150,000 horse power. Again, this is no mean record, but in order to measure it against the march of time it is interesting to note that the total figure of 150,000 horse power is available from a single unit of modern turbo alternator plant. Lest however our president and his electrical brethren should be unduly proud we must remind them that the initial power is still that of steam. This comparison prompts a few others which should be of some interest, even to the weary non-technical members of the audience. 70 years ago, which is within the memory of some amongst us, a common pressure was 40psi. Nowadays in the bigger power stations , 650psi is general, 1,500psi not unknown and there are exceptional cases even higher. The temperature of steam at the engine was seldom more than 290 degrees F but now 850 degrees is normal practice and even 950 where the pipes are at a dull red heat is not unknown. A Land engine of 1000hp was a big job in 1873 but sets of 105,000Kw are now common practice and one of these can be reckoned as equal to 150,000hp. Turbo sets of twice that power are at work in America.

In the matter of speed, a fast running flywheel in 1873 would not exceed 80 ft per second at the rim, or rather less than a mile a minute but ten times that speed is common on the blading of turbines. Efficiency in the utilisation of the heat in the fuel has at least trebled in the same period.

So much for the material things and for material progress. What of the personalities behind our local engineering story. We must first give credit to John Petrie the first of four generations of his name. To him, more than any other, is due the inception, rise and progress of the Phoenix Foundry. He was a man honoured by all with whom he had to do, whether in business or in private life. His integrity was proverbial. He lived in simple, even frugal manner, his favourite diet being porridge and milk. He retired early and rose early and did not cease practical control of the engine business until 1862 when he had turned 70. For over 40 years he was a faithful Sunday School teacher, walking in all weathers up to his class at Pottery School where Syke Chapel is now. He lived well into his 92nd year and died in 1883 full of years and honour.

Upon his retirement from active control the business was led by his sons James and George. James died in 1892, George in 1918. Many of us will remember these gentlemen, as we do other members of a very numerous family which has played a great and worthy part in Rochdale affairs.

William McNaught Senior, for twenty years the right hand man to John Petrie and afterwards the keenest competitor of his old firm, was a most versatile individual. Mathematician, economist, a lover of the flute, student in many abstract things, as well as a most capable engineer and prolific inventor, he was a popular lecturer to engineering societies and Mechanic’s Institutes and even addressed a meeting of naval architects on the subject of the rolling of ships and its prevention. He retired in 1870 and died in 1888 at the age of 76. He has a memorial window in St Peter’s church, Newbold where his eldest son John was for some time organist. John, a most capable business man and William Junior whom the author served for some years and knew as a born engineer, took charge of St George’s Foundry on the father’s retirement. John died in 1893, William in 1916 and there is now no one of that name.

The author would have liked to comment further about other personalities who have played their part sometimes notably, in the local history of the steam engine, but where so many names come to mind, each coupled to some anecdote or another, it is difficult to select those for mention and omission of any may lead to an unintended slight. There will be few however to object to the mention, in connection with the Phoenix Foundry, of George Lye, father to our well known townsman Mr Frederick Lye, whose name first appears in the 1850’s as a leading erector. Of Tom Sawyer, Sam Standing, Tom Wynn, William Wilkinson, the Smiths, Crossleys, Pickerings, Dowells and Frank Shore who is happily still with us, the residuary legatee of the Petrie tradition, and to whom the author is indebted for much of interest in this paper.

When we think of the St George’s Foundry we remember the Rickson family, Tom Pilling, the Smiths (Joe and Sam), the three Holdens, Ernest Holt, Paul Kaberry, George Thompson and, still with us, Jack Bridge who started work in 1877and helped erect the Rochdale Spinning Company’s engines 60 years ago. On the commercial side is the stately figure of James Winterbottom, and on the technical and managerial side we must mention Tom Hawkins, as capable at the organ as at the drawing board, Fred Robinson, Andrew Davidson and others still with us in various walks of life.

All who are mentioned above would, surely, wish me to remember the goodly company of men who, after the draughtsman, fitter and erector had done their part came on the scene as firemen, engine tenters and mill engineers and helped, by careful attention, to uphold the reputation of the engine maker.

Then there are the memorable explosions, runaways and other mishaps which have entered into our local annals but there begins a track which, unlike this paper, has no end.


Transcribed from an old copy by S C Graham/20 November 2000
4187 words.