Industry | Locomotive manufacturing |
---|---|
Predecessor | Sharp, Roberts and Company (1828–1843) Sharp Brothers and Company (1843–1852) |
Founded | 1852 |
Defunct | 1903 |
Fate | Merged |
Successor | North British Locomotive Company |
Headquarters | Manchester, England; Glasgow, Scotland from 1888 |
Sharp, Stewart and Company was a steam locomotive manufacturer, initially located in Manchester, England. The company was formed in 1843 upon the demise of Sharp, Roberts & Co.. It moved to Glasgow, Scotland, in 1888, eventually amalgamating with two other Glaswegian locomotive manufacturers to form the North British Locomotive Company.
Iron merchant Thomas Sharp and mechanical engineer Richard Roberts first formed a partnership, Sharp, Roberts & Co. (about which, see also company section in article on Roberts), to manufacture textile machinery and machine tools. They opened the Atlas Works in Manchester in 1828.
They had built a few stationary steam engines, and in 1833 built a locomotive, Experiment for the Liverpool and Manchester Railway. It was a four-wheeled 2-2-0 with vertical cylinders over the leading wheels. After a number of modifications, three similar locomotives (Britannia, Manchester, and Hibernia ) were built in 1834 for the Dublin and Kingstown Railway. Although they were relatively fast, the vertical cylinders meant they were too hard on the track at speed.
However, in 1834 Charles Beyer also joined the firm and contributed to its success in locomotive building [1] as Roberts soon delegated most of the locomotive design work to him. A new 2-2-2 design was soon produced with horizontal inside cylinders under the smokebox and additional bearings to support the crank axle. Around 600 of these Sharp Single locomotives were built between 1837 and 1857. Ten of the first were sold to the Grand Junction Railway, with the "Sharpies" becoming a standard to compare with the "Bury" engines.
In 1843, Roberts left and the firm became Sharp Brothers and Company. Between 1846 and 1848 the company provided eight 2-2-2 passenger and two 0-4-2 goods locomotives to the Lynn and Dereham Railway. From 1851 to 1853 twenty engines were built for the London and North Western Railway to the design of James Edward McConnell, the so-called "Bloomers", subcontracted from Wolverton.
In 1852, the senior partner, John Sharp, retired and was replaced by Charles Patrick Stewart, the name of the company changing to Sharp, Stewart and Company. Thomas Sharp also retired and was succeeded by Stephen Robinson. In 1860 sole rights were obtained for Giffard's patent injector. The company acquired limited liability in 1864.
The company provided a number of 0-4-0 tender engines for the Furness Railway of which Number 20, built in 1863 has been restored to working order by the Lakeside & Haverthwaite Railway in Cumbria. In 1862, the company began making larger engines, first some 4-6-0 saddle tank engines for the Great Indian Peninsula Railway. By 1865 they were building 0-8-0s, again for India.
Since they were also dealing in general brass and ironmongery, and machine tools, it became necessary to move, which they did in 1888. They took over and moved to the works of the Clyde Locomotive Company in Springburn, Glasgow, renaming it Atlas Works.
A number of compounds were built for the Argentine Central Railway in 1889, some 4-4-0 and some 2-8-0. In 1892 they received an order for seventy five 4-4-0s and 0-6-0s from the Midland Railway. By now they had built a number of 4-6-0 engines for overseas railways, but in 1894 came their first Glasgow order for a British line, the "Jones Goods" of the Highland Railway. By the end of the century they were supplying railways at home and all over the world.
Between 1898 and 1901, Sharp, Stewart and Company supplied no less than 16 4-6-0 and 4 4-8-0 locomotives to New Zealand Railways. The 4-8-0 B class locomotives survived till the end of steam either as-built, or as 4-6-4T engines of the We class. The 4-6-0 locomotives were dumped in rivers and on the coast as erosion protection when their time was up. 3 have since been salvaged for preservation.
In 1903, having built over 5000 engines, the company amalgamated with Neilson, Reid and Company and Dübs and Company to form the North British Locomotive Company.
4-4-0 is a locomotive type with a classification that uses the Whyte notation for the classification of steam locomotives by wheel arrangement and represents the arrangement: four leading wheels on two axles, four powered and coupled driving wheels on two axles, and a lack of trailing wheels. Due to the large number of the type that were produced and used in the United States, the 4-4-0 is most commonly known as the "American" or "Eight-Wheeler" type, but the type subsequently also became popular in the United Kingdom, where large numbers were produced.
A 4-6-0 steam locomotive, under the Whyte notation for the classification of steam locomotives by wheel arrangement, has four leading wheels on two axles in a leading bogie and six powered and coupled driving wheels on three axles with the absence of trailing wheels.
Under the Whyte notation for the classification of steam locomotives, 2-2-0 represents the wheel arrangement of two leading wheels on one axle, two powered driving wheels on one axle, and no trailing wheels. This configuration, which became very popular during the 1830s, was commonly called the Planet type after the first locomotive, Robert Stephenson's Planet of 1830.
The Vulcan Foundry Limited was an English locomotive builder sited at Newton-le-Willows, Lancashire.
The first Locomotives of the Great Western Railway (GWR) were specified by Isambard Kingdom Brunel but Daniel Gooch was soon appointed as the railway's Locomotive Superintendent. He designed several different 7 ft 1⁄4 in broad gauge types for the growing railway, such as the Firefly and later Iron Duke Class 2-2-2s. In 1864 Gooch was succeeded by Joseph Armstrong who brought his standard gauge experience to the workshops at Swindon. To replace some of the earlier locomotives, he put broad gauge wheels on his standard gauge locomotives and from this time on all locomotives were given numbers, including the broad gauge ones that had previously carried just names.
Under the Whyte notation for the classification of steam locomotives, 0-4-2 represents the wheel arrangement with no leading wheels, four powered and coupled driving wheels on two axles and two trailing wheels on one axle. While the first locomotives of this wheel arrangement were tender engines, the configuration was later often used for tank engines, which is noted by adding letter suffixes to the configuration, such as 0-4-2T for a conventional side-tank locomotive, 0-4-2ST for a saddle-tank locomotive, 0-4-2WT for a well-tank locomotive and 0-4-2RT for a rack-equipped tank locomotive.
David Jones (1834–1906) was locomotive superintendent of the Highland Railway between 1870 and 1896. He was credited with the design of the first British 4-6-0, which was strongly influenced by the Scottish locomotive design for Indian Railways. The 4-6-0 wheel arrangement that appeared in 1894, quickly became the most common locomotive for main line passenger and mixed traffic work in Britain.
Sentinel Waggon Works Ltd was a British company based in Shrewsbury, Shropshire that made steam-powered lorries, railway locomotives, and later, diesel engined lorries, buses and locomotives.
Locomotives of the London and North Western Railway. The London and North Western Railway (LNWR) Locomotive Department was headquartered at Crewe from 1862. The Crewe Works had been built in 1840–43 by the Grand Junction Railway (GJR).
The NBR C Class is a class of 0-6-0 steam locomotives designed by Matthew Holmes for freight work on the North British Railway (NBR). They were introduced in 1888 with inside cylinders and Stephenson valve gear. A total of 168 locomotives was built, of which 123 came into British Railways ownership at nationalisation in 1948. This was the last class of steam engine in service in Scotland.
Robert Stephenson and Company was a locomotive manufacturing company founded in 1823 in Forth Street, Newcastle upon Tyne in England. It was the first company in the world created specifically to build railway engines.
R and W Hawthorn Ltd was a locomotive manufacturer in Newcastle upon Tyne, England, from 1817 until 1885.
William Fairbairn and Sons, was an engineering works in Manchester, England.
Neilson and Company was a locomotive manufacturer in Glasgow, Scotland.
The SECR D class is a class of 4-4-0 tender locomotives designed by Harry Wainwright for the South Eastern and Chatham Railway.
George Forrester and Company was a British marine engine and locomotive manufacturer at Vauxhall Foundry in Liverpool, established by Scottish engineer George Forrester. The company opened in 1827 as iron founders and commenced building steam locomotives in 1834.
Hibernia was a steam locomotive designed by Richard Roberts and built by Sharp, Roberts and Company in 1834 for the Dublin and Kingstown Railway (D&KR). The locomotive had vertical cylinders driving via bell cranks.
The Clyde Locomotive Company was a firm of locomotive manufacturers in Springburn, Glasgow, Scotland.
Swiftsure was first of eight or more similar locomotives with a single pair of driving wheels built by George Forrester and Company (Forresters) from 1834. The tank variant was the first passenger tank engine to enter service in the world.