 | |
| Founded | 1874, Leeds, England |
|---|---|
| Founder | Samson Fox |
| Defunct | 1899 (United States), 1929 (United Kingdom) |
| Fate | Fox Solid Pressed Steel company sold to C. T. Schoen in 1899, Armley Works sold to Cammell Laird in 1923. |
| Products | Boiler furnaces and railway stock |
The Leeds Forge Company manufactured corrugated furnaces for marine steam engine boilers and pressed steel railway rolling stock. [1]
The company was founded by Samson Fox, who was born in 1838 in Bradford, Yorkshire. Samson apprenticed with Smith, Beacock and Tannett of Victoria Foundry, Leeds, succeeded Fenton, Murray and Jackson, builders of rail locomotives. While at Smith, Beacock and Tannett, Fox became their travelling representative. During this time he was acquainted with Scotts Shipbuilding and Engineering Company of Greenock, who were major shipbuilders on the Firth of Clyde. Scotts provided a large amount of the capital needed to establish the Leeds Forge at Castleton Field, Armley, Leeds in 1874, initially producing straight and cranked locomotive axles.[ citation needed ] The Leeds Forge Company started out making locomotive crank pins and axles, using hammer forging. [2]
Fox registered a patent for his Corrugated Furnace in 1877. The Corrugated Furnace consisted of an iron (later steel) tube that was heated and swaged (later rolled) under pressure to form corrugations, increasing the surface area of the tube and thus allowing a greater energy transfer from the heat source to the boiler while also providing additional resistance to boiler pressure. James Humphreys of Barrow-in-Furness placed the initial order for six furnaces of 3 ft 1 in (0.9 m) diameter and 7 ft 6 in (2.3 m) long. The next year Fox succeeded in obtaining an order for two American ships and had secured U.S. patents by 1880. The German company Schulz, Knaudt of Essen began Licensed production of the Corrugated Furnace that same year. Leeds Forge rejected license applications from other companies including Taylor Bros, Clarence Ironworks, Leeds and John Brown & Company, Atlas Works, Sheffield. In 18982 Fox introduced the rolling process which led to the commercial success of the furnace, which were routinely fitted to ships both in the United Kingdom and United States. [2]
After the success of the corrugated furnace, Fox turned his attention to other products, and in 1887 exhibited in Newcastle[ clarification needed ] [3] his flanged frame plate for railway rolling stock. Traditional rolling stock was built of timber frames with a timber superstructure, producing a heavy vehicle that required considerable tractive effort from the locomotive. Pressed steel rolling stock was made from relatively lightweight flanged steel, giving it comparable strength to timber but considerable savings in dead weight. The construction technique, which used male and female dies in a hydraulic press, was very labor savings in comparison to hand-built timber cars. Fox found an ally in the promotion of his pressed steel vehicles in E R Calthrop, who promoted pressed steel rolling stock for his system of narrow gauge railways, and used them on the Barsi Light Railway.
The United States showed much more interested in pressed steel cars so in 1889 the Fox Solid Pressed Steel company was established in Joliet, Illinois, 40 miles (64 km) south-west of Chicago. Clem Hackney, who had previously worked for the Union Pacific Railroad, was made general manager. By 1893 the works employed 400 men producing 80 tramcars and freight cars per day. A larger plant was built in Pittsburgh in 1896. In 1899 Fox sold his American operation to rival Charles T. Schoen, who went on to form the Pressed Steel Car Company. The company stayed in business until it was purchased in 1923 by Cammell Laird, which closed the Armley works in 1929. [1] [2]
Leeds Forge successfully sued R.H.Clayton & Sons Ltd over patent infringement for an improved boiler flue. [4] In 1924 the Leeds Forge Company built 50 electric carriages for the New South Wales Government Railways, Australia. The bodies were shipped to Sydney in knocked-down form and assembled at Eveleigh Railway Workshops and Clyde Engineering. They were the first all-steel carriages in Australia. In 1922 they supplied new all steel sleeping cars for the blue trains operating from Calais to French Riviera. [5]
In 1928 Leeds Forge manufactured three Bo-Bo electric hopper cars on behalf of English Electric. They were supplied to British Portland Cement, Greenhithe, Kent. [2]
A bogie is a chassis or framework that carries a wheelset, attached to a vehicle—a modular subassembly of wheels and axles. Bogies take various forms in various modes of transport. A bogie may remain normally attached or be quickly detachable. It may include a suspension component within it, or be solid and in turn be suspended ; it may be mounted on a swivel, as traditionally on a railway carriage or locomotive, additionally jointed and sprung, or held in place by other means.
A locomotive is a rail transport vehicle that provides the motive power for a train. If a locomotive is capable of carrying a payload, it is usually rather referred to as a multiple unit, motor coach, railcar or power car; the use of these self-propelled vehicles is increasingly common for passenger trains, but rare for freight trains.
Rail transport is a means of transport using wheeled vehicles running in tracks, which usually consist of two parallel steel rails. Rail transport is one of the two primary means of land transport, next to road transport. It is used for about 8% of passenger and freight transport globally, thanks to its energy efficiency and potentially high speed.
Wagonways, also known as horse-drawn railways and horse-drawn railroad consisted of the horses, equipment and tracks used for hauling wagons, which preceded steam-powered railways. The terms plateway, tramway, dramway, were used. The advantage of wagonways was that far bigger loads could be transported with the same power.
A rack railway is a steep grade railway with a toothed rack rail, usually between the running rails. The trains are fitted with one or more cog wheels or pinions that mesh with this rack rail. This allows the trains to operate on steep gradients of 100% or more, well above the 10% maximum for friction-based rail. The rack and pinion mechanism also provides more controlled braking and reduces the effects of snow or ice on the rails. Most rack railways are mountain railways, although a few are transit railways or tramways built to overcome a steep gradient in an urban environment. The first cog railway was the Middleton Railway between Middleton and Leeds in West Yorkshire, England, United Kingdom, where the first commercially successful steam locomotive, Salamanca, ran in 1812. This used a rack and pinion system designed and patented in 1811 by John Blenkinsop.
A geared steam locomotive is a type of steam locomotive which uses gearing, usually reduction gearing, in the drivetrain, as opposed to the common directly driven design.
A switcher locomotive, shunter locomotive, or shifter locomotive is a locomotive used for maneuvering railway vehicles over short distances. Switchers do not usually move trains over long distances. Instead, they typically assemble trains in order for another locomotive to take over. Switchers often operate in a railyard or make short transfer runs. They may serve as the primary motive power on short branch lines or switching and terminal railroads.
Rail transport terms are a form of technical terminology applied to railways. Although many terms are uniform across different nations and companies, they are by no means universal, with differences often originating from parallel development of rail transport systems in different parts of the world, and in the national origins of the engineers and managers who built the inaugural rail infrastructure. An example is the term railroad, used in North America, and railway, generally used in English-speaking countries outside North America and by the International Union of Railways. In English-speaking countries outside the United Kingdom, a mixture of US and UK terms may exist.
The Meigs Elevated Railway was an experimental but unsuccessful 19th century elevated steam-powered urban rapid transit system, often described as a monorail but technically pre-electric third rail. It was invented in the US by Josiah Vincent Meigs, of Lowell, Massachusetts, and was demonstrated from 1886 to 1894 in a suburb of Boston called East Cambridge.
Dick, Kerr and Company was a locomotive and tramcar manufacturer based in Kilmarnock, Scotland and Preston, England.
MÁVAG was the largest Hungarian rail vehicle producer. MÁVAG company was the second largest industrial enterprise after the Manfréd Weiss Steel and Metal Works in the Hungarian half of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy. MÁVAG was the property of the Kingdom of Hungary. After World War II MÁVAG was nationalized, and "Királyi" ("Royal") was removed from its name.
Greenwood & Batley were a large engineering manufacturer with a wide range of products, including armaments, electrical engineering, and printing and milling machinery. They also produced a range of battery-electric railway locomotives under the brand name Greenbat. The works was in Armley, Leeds, UK.
Robert Hudson Ltd was a major international supplier of light railway materials, based in Gildersome, near Leeds, England. The name was later changed to Robert Hudson (Raletrux) Ltd.
Hadfields Limited of Hecla and East Hecla Sheffield, Yorkshire was a British manufacturer of special steels in particular manganese alloys and the manufacture of steel castings.
Everard Richard Calthrop was a British railway engineer and inventor. Calthrop was a notable promoter and builder of narrow-gauge railways, especially of 2 ft 6 in narrow gauge, and was especially prominent in India. His most notable achievement was the Barsi Light Railway, but he is best known in his home country for the Leek and Manifold Valley Light Railway. Calthrop has been described as a "railway genius". Later in life he took an interest in aviation, patenting some early designs for parachutes.
Barsi Light Railway (BLR) was a 202-mile (325 km) long, 2 ft 6 in (762 mm) narrow-gauge railway between Miraj and Latur in the state of Maharashtra in India. It was the brainchild of British engineer Everard Calthrop, and regarded as having revolutionised narrow-gauge railway construction in India.
A launch-type, gunboat or horizontal multitubular boiler is a form of small steam boiler. It consists of a cylindrical horizontal shell with a cylindrical furnace and fire-tubes within this.
Samson Fox, JP was an English engineer, industrialist and philanthropist. He was elected Mayor of Harrogate in Yorkshire and the building of the Royal College of Music in London was funded largely by Fox.
The South African Railways Class 18 2-10-2 of 1927 was a steam locomotive.
A train wheel or rail wheel is a type of wheel specially designed for use on railway tracks. The wheel acts as a rolling component, typically press fitted onto an axle and mounted directly on a railway carriage or locomotive, or indirectly on a bogie, also called a truck. The powered wheels under the locomotive are called driving wheels. Wheels are initially cast or forged and then heat-treated to have a specific hardness. New wheels are machined using a lathe to a standardized shape, called a profile, before being installed onto an axle. All wheel profiles are regularly checked to ensure proper interaction between the wheel and the rail. Incorrectly profiled wheels and worn wheels can increase rolling resistance, reduce energy efficiency and may even cause a derailment. The International Union of Railways has defined a standard wheel diameter of 920 mm (36 in), although smaller sizes are used in some rapid transit railway systems and on ro-ro carriages.
