 DURING
1902 the equipment of many of the departments neared completion,
and manufacture started, a mere trickle at first but by the
end of the year employing about 3000 men. The first sections
to be ready were the tool rooms, the patternmaking and carpenters'
shops (which started by making drawing office and works furniture),
and the steel foundry. The works, apart from the 'feeder' departments,
was organized in two main sections—an engine department
making prime movers, and an electrical department.
 On
the mechanical side it was proposed to manufacture reciprocating
steam engines, gas engines, and steam turbines. However, the
higher efficiency of the gas engine combined with the advent
of the turbine to end the manufacture of steam engines before
it had fairly begun.
Westinghouse
gas engines were offered 'from stock' in single and double
acting vertical types for outputs up to 1500 hp, all of American
design; 1000 hp was the biggest actually built. In August
1903 the first two to be made at Trafford Park were shipped—To
His Majesty the King, Sandringham Hall, Norfolk, England.
The
first steam turbines made were of the Parsons reaction type,
built under licence (the first that was issued to a British
company) and based on American practice. The initial orders
were for two 100-kW and two 280-kW back-pressure machines
driving d.c. generators for the Savoy Hotel. There were many
difficulties and delays in getting the first units running,
and the task was no easier because the air in the basement
engine room became unbearably hot. The hotel engineer protested
that he would accept no more deliveries, and when the next
unit arrived on a dray it was refused admission. However H.
N. Baker, who was in charge of London erection for many years,
induced a page boy to lure away the doorkeeper: the gate was
opened, and the waiting turbine deposited in the yard.
By
the end of 1902 eight turbo-generator sets of 5500 kW—an
unprecedented size—had been ordered for the Lot's Road
power station of the Metropolitan District Railway, three
3500-kW sets for Neasden on the Metropolitan Railway, and
the whole power plant for the Motherwell and Yoker stations
of the Clyde Valley Company. These early stations had centralized
lubricating oil systems in which a tank in the roof supplied
all the units in the station by gravity.
The
Lot's Road turbines were dogged by misfortune. The steel rotor
drums were of a complicated shape, and the difficult work
of casting was entrusted to Krupps of Essen. On delivery one
drum was given an overspeed test: the normal design speed
was 900 r.p.m., and at about 1000 r.p.m. the rotor burst into
fragments. The remaining castings were scrapped, and a new
and simpler rotor designed. This had a drum of uniform diameter,
and as the diameter of the inlet portion  was
greater than before, it was logical for
the blades to be proportionately
|
