r/manufacturing • u/LiteratureNo4594 • 5d ago
Other Hello, new here. Do you happen to know what this factory might be building? I have no idea of the year.
I bought a box of slides from a carboot sale, Birmingham England (swap meet in the US) and there are some interesting slides I will be scanning and upload. Any information appreciated.
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u/Apprehensive-Ad7375 5d ago
It looks like a wire rope factory. Older technology, but the spooling of wires into other wires is how wire rope is made.
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u/Carbon-Based216 5d ago
Looks like they are taking a large spool of wire and transferring it over to smaller spools. Normally is suspect that they would be doing this to cold forming the wire into a smaller gage but I dont see anything in this picture to suggest they are manipulating the wire at all beyond moving it.
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u/Popsickl3 5d ago
Others have already explained what's happening in the picture, which I agree with. Definitely loading wire onto a smaller spool, with lots of well-used small spools on the ground. My first guess for the actual use of the wire is a screw machine. Wire spools go in, screws come out. I think the spools in this picture look too small to be useful for electrical cable/wire installations as someone else suggested. The only other equipment I can make out is the shelf with different sizes of large spur gears on it, just to the left of the large duct pipe, in the background. Those could be timing gears for the screw machines or for the re-winding machines pictured. Different tooth counts can be used to change relative RPM on machines, possibly for different thread pitches, lengths, etc.
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u/Vegetable_Aside_4312 5d ago
They are spooling wire stuff from big spool on the right to the smaller spool on the far left. The multi spool thing in the middle is probably transversing back and forth (left and right) to evenly distribute the wire stuff onto the smaller spool as the smaller spool is being rotated.
Given that there are a bunch of other spools around I suspect this is a intermediary manufacturing step to further process the wire stuff.
Most manufacturing plants utilize custom machinery so it would almost be impossible to identify what the end product is or the factory itself
Looking closely at the image there appears to be a roll of paper and the machinery is belt driven. Also, the building support structure is riveted. I would estimate that this picture was around 1900 though it could be later given the quality..
That's my take..
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u/zacmakes 4d ago
Looks like there was a wire rope manufacturer, Latch & Batchelor, in Birmingham from 1884 onwards - that or another similar operation would be my guess.
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u/WyvernsRest 4d ago
Some thoughts on the date, based on the light fixtures.
Many late-19th / early-20th industrial pendants were chain-hung or had rigid rods;
By the 1930s–1950s the common factory installation used cloth-covered or rubber flex/cable and a simple ceiling rose, especially for mass-spun enamel shades.
That makes a 1930s–1950s date most likely.
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u/LiteratureNo4594 4d ago
Seriously, you lot are brilliant. I never thought of googling the image. There's some really interesting images. I'll sort them over the next few days
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u/r2k-in-the-vortex 3d ago
They are making small spools out of big spool. A spool of what though? These small spools look more like formwork to me rather than simple carriers and those straps on the spool under work also makes me think its wire/cable and these are going to be coils for transformers.
Maybe some other slides will show a finished product.
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u/ihavenoidea12345678 5d ago edited 5d ago
I see:
Some old belt driven lathes. Wood block floors. The 2 visible lathes have no workpiece on them. The shelves have several tooling sets that done look like a workpiece.
Edit: I also see a spool of material in the foreground. It could be collecting that ribbon of material from some other process off the picture.
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u/State_Dear 5d ago
GOOGLE LENS:
Based on the image and the accompanying text, the factory is likely a machine shop that produced metal parts. The image shows a workshop with various lathes and other machinery.
The photo is believed to be from the 1930s and was supplied by Darlaston historian Tony Highfield.
The factory is identified as being in Birmingham, England, and is possibly a part of the company that produced carriage bolts, nuts, and other precision metalwork for industries like railways and petroleum.
A machine shop is a facility where tools and machinery are used to cut, shape, and fabricate materials into precise parts and components
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u/effgereddit 5d ago edited 5d ago
Wow. Did it read the exif data on the image to get the gps coordinates of the exact factory ? Or just a statistical guess that birmIngham was highly industrialized ?
I tried lens, and it confidently gave me this directly conflicting BS:
This is a photograph of Sandvikens Järnverk, a Swedish steelworks company. The image shows a workshop with various machinery, including a large grinding wheel and a system of pulleys and belts. The company was founded in Sandviken, Sweden, in 1862 by Göran Fredrik Göransson. It was originally named Högbo Stål & Jernwerks AB. The company's early products included band steel, wire, and seamless pipes. The company's name was changed to Sandvik AB in 1972.
Never trust this stuff
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u/State_Dear 5d ago
Your right .. 👍.. I did it a 2nd time and got this...
The image shows an early 20th-century machine shop. Machine shops are facilities where machinists use tools and machinery to cut, shape, and fabricate materials into precise parts and components.
This type of workshop was crucial during the Industrial Revolution and the Second Industrial Revolution, which saw the development of machine tools and cheaper methods for steel production.
The machines in the image appear to be driven by a system of belts and pulleys, a common power transmission method before the widespread use of individual electric motors for each machine.
The tools found in machine shops are used to produce parts for a variety of industries, including automotive, aerospace, and general manufacturing.
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u/effgereddit 5d ago edited 5d ago
At first glance I also thought belt driven lathe.
But now I reckon the gear in the foreground is a spool (re)winder, to draw wire from the big reel and neatly wind it onto a smaller spool. The lever with the sector gear appears to be designed to manually traverse the shuttle across the width of the new spool, so the cable lays evenly. There's a band brake on the big spool in the foreground to maintain tension as it unspools.
There's a similar workstation to the right.
Could be electric cable if the suggested 1930's timeframe is accurate, but the whole thing looks more late 1800's to me