Firth Brown Steels
Encyclopedia
Firth Brown Steels was initially formed in 1902, when Sheffield
steelmakers John Brown and Company exchanged shares and came to a working agreement with neighbouring company Thomas Firth & Sons. In 1908 the two companies came together and established the Brown Firth Research Laboratories and it was here, in 1912, under the leadership of Harry Brearley
they developed high chrome stainless steel. The companies continued under their own management until they formally merged in 1930 becoming Firth Brown Steels.
The company was amalgamated into Sheffield Forgemasters in 1982.
founded his company in the 1840s to manufacture steel files. Over the years the emphasis moved to the manufacture of rails, made from steel provided by the new Bessemer process, and later to rail coach springs. Shipcladding and shipbuilding interests came into the company portfolio and finally, in the 1950s to general construction.
Following an eight year role in successfully selling files and cutlery around the world in 1844, John Brown started in his own right a steel making company in Orchard Street, Sheffield, on the site of the present Orchard Square
shopping development. There was no room for expansion on the site and his second works was opened in Furnival Street, a short distance away. Business expanded rapidly and more new premises were needed, this time in Holly Street, just over the road from his original works. Having works scattered throughout the city centre area made for production problems and because of this, on 1 January 1856, he opened a totally new works on a single site on the edge of the city, in Savile Street which he named Atlas Works.
In 1846, whilst still at Orchard Square, he invented the conical railway buffer and became a market leader in the United Kingdom. Once settled on the new Atlas Works site he decided to make use of the steel puddling process. Whilst the steel produced by this method is not of the high quality which was being made by the crucible process it was ideal for making railway springs and buffers and, importantly, cheaper to produce.
In the late 1830s Thomas Firth was head melter at Sheffield crucible steelmakers Sanderson Brothers. He had fathered ten children, seven boys and three girls.
Two of the sons, Mark
and Thomas junior followed in fathers footsteps and started work at Sanderson Brothers but in 1842 left to set up their own business in Charlotte Street, Sheffield, their father joining them shortly afterwards. In ten years their business had grown and it was necessary to find larger premises. With land available they moved to a large site in Savile Street, Sheffield, adjacent to the works set up by John Brown
. It was named Norfolk Works and had crucible furnaces, a file making shop and, what was at the time, the largest rolling mill in Sheffield.
Business grew and moved into the armaments market, the company installing two Nasmyth Steam forge hammers in 1863 which were used to forge guns. In 1871, Firth's cast the thirty five ton Woolwich Infant gun and 5 years later they produced an eighty ton gun.
Mark, whilst at his Norfolk Works, suffered a stroke on 16 November 1880 and died at his Sheffield home 12 days later and was buried in the General Cemetery. The company, however, continued.
In 1902 Sheffield steelmakers John Brown & Company exchanged shares and came to a working agreement with neighbouring company Thomas Firth & Sons, the companies continuing under their own management until they finally merged in 1930.
In 1936, in an attempt to extend and diversify its business interests they bought a considerable amount of shares in Westland Aircraft Ltd. of Yeovil and the following year they purchased Markham & Co.
, of Chesterfield a company well known for its machinery, especially its winding engines and ancillary machinery for the mining industry and tunnelling machines, which were used in excavations for the London
and Moscow Undergrounds and the Paris Métro
.
In 1957, the company acquired the Parkhead
Forge in Glasgow
, that had been formerly owned by William Beardmore and Company
, before eventually closing the site in 1976.
In 1982 Firth Brown's and near neighbour British Steel
's River Don Works amalgamated to form Sheffield Forgemasters, a company now totally within the private sector with a 50:50 division of the shares between JFB and the government. The following year the company hit trouble and the shareholders voted to write off debt, sack the company's board and set up a rescue package with new management.
In 1998 the company was sold in two sections to American buyers, the aerospace section was sold to Allegheny Teledyne and the River Don and Rolls section to Atchison Castings. This later business failed and the company went into liquidation in 2003 and only after clearing many hurdles did it become the subject of a management buy out.
Still working, and with good order books, the company is now in its third century, and is one of the oldest established steel making companies in the world.
, and this was bought 1899 for a sum of around 1 million GBP. The newly acquired yard became the shipbuilding division of the John Brown group.
During the first decade of the 20th century, the company succeeded becoming a leader in marine engineering technology with the development of the Brown-Curtis turbine, the propelling machinery chosen by the Royal Navy
for many of its major warships.
Following the end of hostilities in 1918 orders for new ships and guns fell. Foreign competition and workers' strikes
compounded Firth Brown's problems. Although the shipyards received a few orders, some from Australia, it was not until a 1931 order from the Cunard Line to build the RMS Queen Mary
that things began to look up. The Cunard order was followed by one from Canadian Pacific and a further liner order from Cunard (for the Queen Elizabeth
). The British government ordered two sloops, two destroyers, and a 9,000-ton cruiser to follow keeping the yard busy, and profitable, through the first half of the 1930s.
By the mid-1960s, the company gave notice that its shipyard was uneconomic and potentially faced closure. In 1967, as the Cunard liner Queen Elizabeth 2
neared completion, the shipyard became part of Upper Clyde Shipbuilders
but this was the beginning of the end, in 1971 UCS went into liquidation.
. The problem concerned the erosion of the internal surfaces of gun barrels and Brearley was charged with finding a suitable material which would offer better resistance to the erosion caused by high temperatures and he began to examine the addition of chromium
to a standard carbon steel.
The well told story is that Brearley noticed in his sample bin one of his pieces which had not shown signs of rusting after being exposed to air and water. This was further examined and analysed; a new steel, which he called "rustless steel", was born, the first commercial cast coming from the furnaces in 1913. Its name was changed the more euphonic "stainless steel
" following a suggestion from Ernest Stuart of R.F. Moseley's, a local cutlery maker, and this eventually prevailed.
Brearley also appreciated the potential of these new steels for applications not only in high temperature service, as originally envisaged, but also in the mass production of food-related applications such as cutlery, saucepans and processing equipment etc.
Virtually all research into the further development of stainless steels was interrupted by the First World War, but started again in the 1920s. Although Harry Brearley resigned from the Brown Firth Laboratories in 1915, following a disagreement over patent rights, the research continued under the direction of his successor, Dr. W. H. Hatfield. It is he who is credited with the development, in 1924, of a stainless steel which is still the widest-used alloy of this type, the so-called "18/8" – Staybrite, which in addition to chromium, includes nickel in its composition. A specialised high-temperature steel devised in 1939 was Rex 78 and its derivatives, Rex 78 being used on the turbine blading of Frank Whittle
's early jet engine
s such as the Power Jets W.1
.
in 1934. A large area, sponsored by Firth Brown, was named "Staybrite City", (taking its name from the trade mark name of the company's stainless steel). Stands within the area included that of J & J Wiggin and the Old Hall tableware exhibited there proved to be a resounding success. Dr. W H Hatfield commissioned Harold Stabler, one of the country's leading industrial designers, to design a new range of high quality tea and coffee services for Old Hall. They were extremely elegant but subsequently proved to be expensive to manufacture.
Sheffield
Sheffield is a city and metropolitan borough of South Yorkshire, England. Its name derives from the River Sheaf, which runs through the city. Historically a part of the West Riding of Yorkshire, and with some of its southern suburbs annexed from Derbyshire, the city has grown from its largely...
steelmakers John Brown and Company exchanged shares and came to a working agreement with neighbouring company Thomas Firth & Sons. In 1908 the two companies came together and established the Brown Firth Research Laboratories and it was here, in 1912, under the leadership of Harry Brearley
Harry Brearley
Harry Brearley is usually credited with the invention of "rustless steel" in the anglophone world.-Life:...
they developed high chrome stainless steel. The companies continued under their own management until they formally merged in 1930 becoming Firth Brown Steels.
The company was amalgamated into Sheffield Forgemasters in 1982.
History of John Brown and Company
John BrownJohn Brown (industrialist)
Sir John Brown , British industrialist, was born in Sheffield. He was known as the Father of the South Yorkshire Iron Trade....
founded his company in the 1840s to manufacture steel files. Over the years the emphasis moved to the manufacture of rails, made from steel provided by the new Bessemer process, and later to rail coach springs. Shipcladding and shipbuilding interests came into the company portfolio and finally, in the 1950s to general construction.
Following an eight year role in successfully selling files and cutlery around the world in 1844, John Brown started in his own right a steel making company in Orchard Street, Sheffield, on the site of the present Orchard Square
Orchard Square
Orchard Square is a small open-air court shopping centre located in Sheffield, England. It opened in 1987 and contains several stores, notably Schuh, Clarks, Waterstone's , River Island, Subway, The Body Shop and TK Maxx...
shopping development. There was no room for expansion on the site and his second works was opened in Furnival Street, a short distance away. Business expanded rapidly and more new premises were needed, this time in Holly Street, just over the road from his original works. Having works scattered throughout the city centre area made for production problems and because of this, on 1 January 1856, he opened a totally new works on a single site on the edge of the city, in Savile Street which he named Atlas Works.
In 1846, whilst still at Orchard Square, he invented the conical railway buffer and became a market leader in the United Kingdom. Once settled on the new Atlas Works site he decided to make use of the steel puddling process. Whilst the steel produced by this method is not of the high quality which was being made by the crucible process it was ideal for making railway springs and buffers and, importantly, cheaper to produce.
History of Thomas Firth & Sons
Two of the sons, Mark
Mark Firth
Mark Firth was an English industrialist and philanthropist.Born in Sheffield, Mark joined the crucible steel works of Sanderson Brothers where his father worked as head smelter, but left in 1842 to set up his own business with his brother, Thomas Jr, in 1842...
and Thomas junior followed in fathers footsteps and started work at Sanderson Brothers but in 1842 left to set up their own business in Charlotte Street, Sheffield, their father joining them shortly afterwards. In ten years their business had grown and it was necessary to find larger premises. With land available they moved to a large site in Savile Street, Sheffield, adjacent to the works set up by John Brown
John Brown (industrialist)
Sir John Brown , British industrialist, was born in Sheffield. He was known as the Father of the South Yorkshire Iron Trade....
. It was named Norfolk Works and had crucible furnaces, a file making shop and, what was at the time, the largest rolling mill in Sheffield.
Business grew and moved into the armaments market, the company installing two Nasmyth Steam forge hammers in 1863 which were used to forge guns. In 1871, Firth's cast the thirty five ton Woolwich Infant gun and 5 years later they produced an eighty ton gun.
Mark, whilst at his Norfolk Works, suffered a stroke on 16 November 1880 and died at his Sheffield home 12 days later and was buried in the General Cemetery. The company, however, continued.
Coming Together
In 1936, in an attempt to extend and diversify its business interests they bought a considerable amount of shares in Westland Aircraft Ltd. of Yeovil and the following year they purchased Markham & Co.
Markham & Co.
Markham & Co. is an ironworks and steelworks company near Chesterfield, Derbyshire, England.- History :The Victoria Foundry near Chesterfield, Derbyshire was owned and successfully run by father and son partnership John and William Oliver from the mid-1850s until 1862 when, following the death of...
, of Chesterfield a company well known for its machinery, especially its winding engines and ancillary machinery for the mining industry and tunnelling machines, which were used in excavations for the London
London Underground
The London Underground is a rapid transit system serving a large part of Greater London and some parts of Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire and Essex in England...
and Moscow Undergrounds and the Paris Métro
Paris Métro
The Paris Métro or Métropolitain is the rapid transit metro system in Paris, France. It has become a symbol of the city, noted for its density within the city limits and its uniform architecture influenced by Art Nouveau. The network's sixteen lines are mostly underground and run to 214 km ...
.
In 1957, the company acquired the Parkhead
Parkhead
Parkhead is a district in the East End of Glasgow. Its name comes from a small weaving hamlet at the meeting place of the Great Eastern Road and Westmuir Street. Duke Street and Springfield Road also meet there, to form a turreted Edwardian five-way junction at Parkhead Cross...
Forge in Glasgow
Glasgow
Glasgow is the largest city in Scotland and third most populous in the United Kingdom. The city is situated on the River Clyde in the country's west central lowlands...
, that had been formerly owned by William Beardmore and Company
William Beardmore and Company
William Beardmore and Company was a Scottish engineering and shipbuilding conglomerate based in Glasgow and the surrounding Clydeside area. It was active between about 1890 and 1930 and at its peak employed about 40,000 people...
, before eventually closing the site in 1976.
In 1982 Firth Brown's and near neighbour British Steel
British Steel
British Steel was a major British steel producer. It originated as a nationalised industry, the British Steel Corporation , formed in 1967. This was converted to a public limited company, British Steel PLC, and privatised in 1988. It was once a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index...
's River Don Works amalgamated to form Sheffield Forgemasters, a company now totally within the private sector with a 50:50 division of the shares between JFB and the government. The following year the company hit trouble and the shareholders voted to write off debt, sack the company's board and set up a rescue package with new management.
In 1998 the company was sold in two sections to American buyers, the aerospace section was sold to Allegheny Teledyne and the River Don and Rolls section to Atchison Castings. This later business failed and the company went into liquidation in 2003 and only after clearing many hurdles did it become the subject of a management buy out.
Still working, and with good order books, the company is now in its third century, and is one of the oldest established steel making companies in the world.
Shipbuilding
In the late 1890s a spate of company mergers left John Brown's in the position where it could be forced out of the lucrative Admiralty market unless it could find another way for its products to be sold and used by the Government. The company looked around shipbuilders for a potential purchase, a yard which had plenty of Admiralty work and would be amenable to a takeover. This yard was found in the shape of the Clydebank Shipbuilding and Engineering Co.John Brown & Company
John Brown and Company of Clydebank was a pre-eminent Scottish marine engineering and shipbuilding firm, responsible for building many notable and world-famous ships, such as the , the , the , the , the , and the...
, and this was bought 1899 for a sum of around 1 million GBP. The newly acquired yard became the shipbuilding division of the John Brown group.
During the first decade of the 20th century, the company succeeded becoming a leader in marine engineering technology with the development of the Brown-Curtis turbine, the propelling machinery chosen by the Royal Navy
Royal Navy
The Royal Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Founded in the 16th century, it is the oldest service branch and is known as the Senior Service...
for many of its major warships.
Following the end of hostilities in 1918 orders for new ships and guns fell. Foreign competition and workers' strikes
General strike
A general strike is a strike action by a critical mass of the labour force in a city, region, or country. While a general strike can be for political goals, economic goals, or both, it tends to gain its momentum from the ideological or class sympathies of the participants...
compounded Firth Brown's problems. Although the shipyards received a few orders, some from Australia, it was not until a 1931 order from the Cunard Line to build the RMS Queen Mary
RMS Queen Mary
RMS Queen Mary is a retired ocean liner that sailed primarily in the North Atlantic Ocean from 1936 to 1967 for the Cunard Line...
that things began to look up. The Cunard order was followed by one from Canadian Pacific and a further liner order from Cunard (for the Queen Elizabeth
RMS Queen Elizabeth
RMS Queen Elizabeth was an ocean liner operated by the Cunard Line. Plying with her running mate Queen Mary as a luxury liner between Southampton, UK and New York City, USA via Cherbourg, France, she was also contracted for over twenty years to carry the Royal Mail as the second half of the two...
). The British government ordered two sloops, two destroyers, and a 9,000-ton cruiser to follow keeping the yard busy, and profitable, through the first half of the 1930s.
By the mid-1960s, the company gave notice that its shipyard was uneconomic and potentially faced closure. In 1967, as the Cunard liner Queen Elizabeth 2
RMS Queen Elizabeth 2
Queen Elizabeth 2, often referred to simply as the QE2, is an ocean liner that was operated by Cunard from 1969 to 2008. Following her retirement from cruising, she is now owned by Istithmar...
neared completion, the shipyard became part of Upper Clyde Shipbuilders
Upper Clyde Shipbuilders
Upper Clyde Shipbuilders was a British shipbuilding consortium created in 1968 as a result of the amalgamation of five major shipbuilders of the River Clyde in Scotland...
but this was the beginning of the end, in 1971 UCS went into liquidation.
Stainless steels
As with many inventions there is an element of luck in the finding of a new type of steel and it is just so with stainless steel. With the coming together of Frith and Brown to build a joint research facility (Brown Firth Laboratories) in 1908, a project was instigated to study one of the problems affecting armaments production. In charge of this was Harry BrearleyHarry Brearley
Harry Brearley is usually credited with the invention of "rustless steel" in the anglophone world.-Life:...
. The problem concerned the erosion of the internal surfaces of gun barrels and Brearley was charged with finding a suitable material which would offer better resistance to the erosion caused by high temperatures and he began to examine the addition of chromium
Chromium
Chromium is a chemical element which has the symbol Cr and atomic number 24. It is the first element in Group 6. It is a steely-gray, lustrous, hard metal that takes a high polish and has a high melting point. It is also odorless, tasteless, and malleable...
to a standard carbon steel.
The well told story is that Brearley noticed in his sample bin one of his pieces which had not shown signs of rusting after being exposed to air and water. This was further examined and analysed; a new steel, which he called "rustless steel", was born, the first commercial cast coming from the furnaces in 1913. Its name was changed the more euphonic "stainless steel
Stainless steel
In metallurgy, stainless steel, also known as inox steel or inox from French "inoxydable", is defined as a steel alloy with a minimum of 10.5 or 11% chromium content by mass....
" following a suggestion from Ernest Stuart of R.F. Moseley's, a local cutlery maker, and this eventually prevailed.
Brearley also appreciated the potential of these new steels for applications not only in high temperature service, as originally envisaged, but also in the mass production of food-related applications such as cutlery, saucepans and processing equipment etc.
Virtually all research into the further development of stainless steels was interrupted by the First World War, but started again in the 1920s. Although Harry Brearley resigned from the Brown Firth Laboratories in 1915, following a disagreement over patent rights, the research continued under the direction of his successor, Dr. W. H. Hatfield. It is he who is credited with the development, in 1924, of a stainless steel which is still the widest-used alloy of this type, the so-called "18/8" – Staybrite, which in addition to chromium, includes nickel in its composition. A specialised high-temperature steel devised in 1939 was Rex 78 and its derivatives, Rex 78 being used on the turbine blading of Frank Whittle
Frank Whittle
Air Commodore Sir Frank Whittle, OM, KBE, CB, FRS, Hon FRAeS was a British Royal Air Force engineer officer. He is credited with independently inventing the turbojet engine Air Commodore Sir Frank Whittle, OM, KBE, CB, FRS, Hon FRAeS (1 June 1907 – 9 August 1996) was a British Royal Air...
's early jet engine
Jet engine
A jet engine is a reaction engine that discharges a fast moving jet to generate thrust by jet propulsion and in accordance with Newton's laws of motion. This broad definition of jet engines includes turbojets, turbofans, rockets, ramjets, pulse jets...
s such as the Power Jets W.1
Power Jets W.1
|-See also:-Bibliography:*Gunston, Bill. World Encyclopedia of Aero Engines. Cambridge, England. Patrick Stephens Limited, 1989. ISBN 1-85260-163-9*Jane's Fighting Aircraft of World War II. London. Studio Editions Ltd, 1998...
.
Stainless steel in the home
Stainless steel was developed for a variety of industrial uses but it became clear that it could have uses around the home. It was first shown in this context at the "Daily Mail" Ideal Home Exhibition, staged at London's OlympiaOlympia, London
Olympia is an exhibition centre and conference centre in West Kensington, on the boundary between The Royal Borough of Kensington & Chelsea and Hammersmith & Fulham, London, W14 8UX, England. It opened in the 19th century and was originally known as the National Agricultural Hall.Opened in 1886,...
in 1934. A large area, sponsored by Firth Brown, was named "Staybrite City", (taking its name from the trade mark name of the company's stainless steel). Stands within the area included that of J & J Wiggin and the Old Hall tableware exhibited there proved to be a resounding success. Dr. W H Hatfield commissioned Harold Stabler, one of the country's leading industrial designers, to design a new range of high quality tea and coffee services for Old Hall. They were extremely elegant but subsequently proved to be expensive to manufacture.
External link
- Flying Steel - 25 Years of Stainless Steel in the Jet Age a 1963 FlightFlight InternationalFlight International is a global aerospace weekly publication produced in the UK. Founded in 1909, it is the world's oldest continuously published aviation news magazine...
article on Firth-Vickers stainless steels