BSC River Don Works

[eastwestdivide]

Fascinating video, especially for us mere mortals who think a soldering iron gets pretty hot. I like the combination of brute force and precision involved. Are those presses/hammers pre-programmed with the right size and movements to make, or is there a highly-skilled operator? And why the multi-faceted shape? 

[Ruston]

Thanks for posting that; I'd always thought that rolls would have been cast 'round', then milled and turned to finished shape. Is there a particular reason for forging them, rather than casting? Does the hammering somehow impart strength?

I've probably mentioned it before, but my father's first trade was as a roll turner with Richard Thomas and Baldwin- the 'end-product' in the film above would have been the starting point for him.

I'm sure someone will be along to explain it better but as far as I know, steel is made up of crystals at a microscopic level. The crystals in the heated steel, when pressed in the forge or hammer, are somehow re-arranged and broken down. After forging it is re-heated and the crystals re-form but smaller and therefore with stronger bonds.

Edited February 12, 2014 by Ruston

[Fat Controller]

I'm sure someone will be along to explain it better but as far as I know, steel is made up of crystals at a microscopic level. The crystals in the heated steel, when pressed in the forge or hammer, are somehow re-arranged and broken down. After forging it is re-heated and the crystals re-form but smaller and therefore with stronger bonds.

Sounds plausible..

[Enterprisingwestern]

Thanks for posting those.

 

Here's a video, found by Arthur, that I think is worth sharing.

 

 

 

Softies, this is the way to press metal;

 

 

Mike.

[Debs.]

Dave,

If you`re modelling hot-forgings, then Arthur uses a paint-layering technique for simulating hot-ingots which are cooling on the edges, which works amazingly well and Arthur`s instructions on how I might accomplish it, were also spot on!

 

........as people often say: "if Deb. could manage to do it, then it must be easy!"

 

 

[Arthur]

Mike, I would imagine that there is some CNC/automated control in some forging operations these days though still with a high degree of skilled operator input. Whatever, the operation of this this 6,000 ton press at Firth Brown in Sheffield, around 1937, was all down to skilled men. Forging, especially very large pieces, is a very costly process and there was a lot of value in the items these men worked on.

 

 

Correct Brian, rolls are mostly cast but some were forged. I don't know why other than that they would have been very hard wearing and long lasting. Clearly, in some high demand applications, the cost was seen as justified.

 

 

Most ferrous metals are worked in some manner prior to use. The oldest ferrous metal in the service of man is wrought (worked) iron which preceded the use of simple cast iron. The working improves its strength.

 

With steel, only about 3% of production is used cast, the rest is worked, 95% by rolling and 2% by forging. Casting is useful for complex shapes but the steel is comparatively weak, especially at corners and where there is restricted flow within the mould. The cheapest method of working in strength is rolling (though the primary aim is to shape it). Forging is very expensive and is reserved for items that will experience very high and multidirectional stresses in service. Heavy, high speed, rotating shafts are examples, steam turbine rotors, ships prop shafts, large crankshafts along with vessels expected to contain high pressures and gun barrels.

 

You're right Dave, like other metals, steel has a crystalline structure and that structure develops as it cools within the mould. Unfortunately the size and type of crystal varies as cooling proceeds and all ingots have a pre-defined and variable crystalline structure which gives variable strength across them. Two other factors influencing ingot strength are grain, the 'flow' of the crystals and the presence of spaces (piping) or gas, CO, bubbles (blowholes). Rolling and forging can both work these weaknesses out. By closing and welding up spaces and blowholes, by reworking of the crystalline structure (also improved with heat treatment) and by working the grain into the optimum flow. Like wood, steel is strongest along the grain. Rolling tends to produce a linear grain, fine for most applications, however for the most demanding of applications, where stresses are not linear but multi directional, forging is required. A spanner is a simple example. Imagine a spanner cut out of a wooden plank. Apply torque across the jaws and imagine where they would split/tear. The jaws would break at their base, along the grain. Cut a spanner out of steel plate and the grain is straight, it does not flow around the jaws, apply torque across them and the jaws again split along the grain. Forging shapes the grain to follow the curve of the jaws so the stresses are transmitted along the grain not across it.

 

A good example of a need to forge a product is the disc on a gas turbine shaft to which the blades are fitted, and which will be revolving at very high speed. The centripetal forces radiate out equally from the centre. A disc cut from plate has it's grain in one plane, at right angles to that plane the centripetal forces are tearing the grain, and disc, apart. Forging it by squeezing down on, and flattening a round billet into a disc, works the grain into a radial flow, ideal for withstanding these centripetal forces.

 

Writing this seven hours into a power cut so I've nothing better to do.....

 

There will be a test tomorrow.....

 

Anecdote: my brother was a centre lathe turner in the steam turbine section of the heavy power division of AEI, later GEC, in Trafford Park. They had heavy forged turbine shafts, weighing tens of tons, brought in from forges in Sheffield, turned them up, fitted the discs and rotor blades etc., by which time they were worth half a million (this the mid 70s). Then test assembled and delivered in bits to power stations across the globe. Wynns and Pickfords were regular visitors, both having depots in the Park.

 

One day, a driver, with a finished turbine rotor shaft on board, was manoeuvring in the works yard and managed to jerk the trailer such that the rotor shaft snapped it's securing straps, rolled onto the yard and embedded itself 18" into the Tarmac. Not the sort of phone call you want to make to your boss!

 

Nine hours, power back on, upload!

[Ruston]

Thanks for that, Arthur.

 

Debs - I've painted the ingot but it doesn't look as good as yours. If you can let me know how it's done I'll repaint it. I'll have a few others to do at some point too.

 

Structures

 

The main building would need to be tall enough for a gantry crane to pass over the forge press and to also give clearance to lift the teeming ladle in the foundry. It also needs to dominate the layout to give a sense of scale to things and to show that the railway is merely the servant of industry and not the star of the show as it would be with, for example, a branch line terminus.

(Apologies for poor quality pics) This thing has consumed a large sheet of card and 3 1/2 packs of Wills corrugated iron and is a scale 57-feet tall. The brick building on the left is for smaller foundry operations and engineering stores etc. In a change of plan the gantry crane that I put on the track plan as being over the bottom right hand sidings will now go in front of this building for loading/unloading road vehicles.

 

An overall view. As you'll notice, I've added backscene boards, which are 10 inches above track level.

Edited February 15, 2014 by Ruston

[Enterprisingwestern]

As it's a Sheffield steelworks, might you have room for this?;

 

http://www.britishpathe.com/video/worlds-largest-railway-wagon/query/railway

 

Mike.

[Debs.]

Debs - I've painted the ingot but it doesn't look as good as yours. If you can let me know how it's done I'll repaint it. I'll have a few others to do at some point too.

P.M sent.

[Arthur]

That first photo gives the first real idea of what it's going to look like. It's certainly starting to capture the look of those steelworks and forges which were so characteristic of the Attercliffe and Brightside areas of Sheffield.

 

Here's a link to Uwe Niggemeier's site, the Sheffield Forgemasters page, there's a couple of external shots plus some of the activities within. I've corresponded with Uwe a couple of times and his site contains lots of steel industry photos from around the world. He's been allowed remarkable access to some of these plants and his photography is top notch.

 

http://www.stahlseite.de/sfm.htm

[Alex TM]

Hi Dave,

 

I have been following this since the initial design thread.  All I can say, really, is that I am very impressed.

 

I grew up in a new-town surrounded by rolling hills but found myself ever more interested in the steel mill (Gartcosh) and the pits (Cardowan & Bedlay) that lay not so far away; on a clear day we could even see the plume of dark smoke from some of the pours at Ravenscraig (even though we couldn't see Motherwell).  To me this layout really does convey something about what they railways were about and were truly good at.  Please keep up the good work.  Hopefully it'll tempt you to stay in 00 for a bit longer.

 

Regards,

 

Alex.

[APOLLO]

This is an interesting video of Sheffield's industrial railways

 

 

Brit15

[Ruston]

It's all coming along nicely now.

 

Another overview.

I've built the gantry crane (Walthers kit) and started to add a concrete apron to go with it.

 

Staircases to access the interior gantry cranes and for bulding maintenance etc. are starting to appear. The Walthers kit on the exterior crane has been modified. The near end gives access to road vehicles and the gap between supports needed to be larger so I beefed up that section with a scratchbuilt addition.

 

The last of the main buildings under construction - the Electric Arc Furnace building.

The shell is made from picture mounting card...

 

... covered with Wills corrugated iron, corrugated asbestos and brick sheeting.

[eastwestdivide]

Have you got a suitable name to go on the building yet? A bit like the one on the railway side of Forgemasters, with a little door and platform so that people can come out and clean it.

I've got a liking for "Long Bar Treatment" also visible from the train N of Sheffield. You can imagine someone coming in to the counter with a piece of bar, and asking, "can you treat this for me?". The chap behind the counter, who's wearing a brown coat, and has a pencil behind his ear, whips out a tape measure, and says, "Nah, too short. Try next door."

[Ruston]

Not a chap in a brown coat being asked for four candles then?

 

No, I've not got any lettering to go on the building. I've got a large BSC logo transfer that Arthur gave to me but I'm not sure if I'm going to use it. It would definitely age the layout to post-1968 and I have ideas of getting a Dapol L&Y pug and building a Manning Wardle body onto it and back-dating the whole lot occasionally by changing the rolling stock and road vehicles and having overlays to go on the roller shutter doors to hide the yellow.black stripes. I reckon everything else is pretty timeless back to the 1930s at least.

 

Having said that if I can make the logo as a 3D thing and fix it and any lettering to the building in a way that it's easily removable, I could also make one that reads "English Steel Co.".

[eastwestdivide]

I was thinking something more nondescript, that didn't date it too obviously. Doing a removable one's an excellent idea though. Here's a few I've collected:

 

[Ruston]

Interesting but I don't know how I would make such lettering as in the last pic.

 

Meanwhile... part of the backscene, formed by a low-relief building. It's a Skytrex resin moulding that I bought in its unpainted state.

 

The canal end.

 

And finally...

Can you tell what it is yet? It's an easy one, I think but then I know what it is so I would say that.

[eastwestdivide]

Pipe bridge with anti-climbing spikes?

[Ruston]

Yes, Mickey, I like it too. So much so that I'm going to get another one for the canal side. The windows on the building that I made from Wills sheet and windows look too big and I know that if I leave it it will annoy me - why spoil the ship for a ha'pennorth of tar (or in this case 17 quid's worth (!) of resin moulding)?. Of course I'll have to get the opposite facing type because (and this is something I never knew until a few weeks ago) the 'lights' (windows) in the roof are supposed to face north so the light gets in but not the glare of the sun. So it would look all wrong if the buildings faced opposite ways. Funny how when you learn these things you have to make sure it's right, whereas before you knew it wouldn't have mattered, same as with those hopper wagons...

 

And yes, the thing is a pipe bridge with spikes to stop ne'er do wells from climbing on them. Of course there's always one who manages to get over them, isn't there?

Edited February 23, 2014 by Ruston

[DanielB]

As someone who spends a fair bit of time in Sheffield, especially around the steel works areas, I have to say you have this pretty much spot on as far as my (admittedly rather limited) experience is concerned.

[Ruston]

For some reason my edit disappeared! I was just saying how I did the lettering on Barnsley's.

 

The lettering was designed in Photoshop and printed onto clear transfer paper. The areas on the building where the transfers are was roughly painted with white acrylic paint. Roughly so as to leave some of the mortar courses showing. The transfers were applied using Humbrol Decalfix and left overnight to allow the Decalfix to soften and draw them in to the mortar courses. The print quality was a bit rough but this has given the transfers an aged appearance and improved them, in my opinion.

 

George Barnsley and Sons was a real company in Sheffield but actually made tools for leather workers and shoe makers. The rest of the signage was inspired by another building in Sheffield.

Edited February 23, 2014 by Ruston

[Ruston]

This is the inspiration for the signage http://sportregeneration.com/images/Regeneration%20Sport%205%20A.jpg

 

And this is the real George Barnsley's http://www.28dayslater.co.uk/forums/industrial-sites/81975-george-barnsley-sons-sheffield-june-13-a.html Beautiful, isn't it?

 

I knew about this place because I do a bit of that urban exploration stuff myself, although stick to the much safer environment of abandoned mines  - less pigeon sh1t or security men and big dogs 

Edited February 23, 2014 by Ruston

[Arthur]

That Skytrex resin building looks very good, great job with the painting and lettering. For raised lettering there's the Slaters range, available in different sizes.

 

The George Barnsleys photos are, as Mickey says, both sad and fascinating, a lost world.

 

It's coming together really well Dave.

[sparks]

For some reason my edit disappeared! I was just saying how I did the lettering on Barnsley's.

 

The lettering was designed in Photoshop and printed onto clear transfer paper. The areas on the building where the transfers are was roughly painted with white acrylic paint. Roughly so as to leave some of the mortar courses showing. The transfers were applied using Humbrol Decalfix and left overnight to allow the Decalfix to soften and draw them in to the mortar courses. The print quality was a bit rough but this has given the transfers an aged appearance and improved them, in my opinion.

 

George Barnsley and Sons was a real company in Sheffield but actually made tools for leather workers and shoe makers. The rest of the signage was inspired by another building in Sheffield.

 

I've been trying to work out how to achieve this very effect with transfer paper - I hadn't though of painting white underneath. Obvious really when you think about it though. Thank you!

[cheesysmith]

As for changing the logo, have you thought of mounting it on a piece of metal, and gluing a strong magnet on the inside of the building so as to allow you to change the plate and logo at will?