C. A. Parsons and Co
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of Heaton Works, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, Northumberland.
See also Parsons Turbines: Early Examples, Parsons Marine Steam Turbine Co, and C. A. Parsons and Co: Electricity Generation and Transmission.
1884 The first Parsons turbo-generator was completed; by 1888 about 200 were in service, mainly for lighting on ships.
1888 First use of steam turbines for power electricity supply, at Forth Banks, Newcastle. Largest units 200 HP.
1889 Charles Algernon Parsons left Clarke, Chapman, Parsons and Co, who made the first Parsons turbines. He took twelve employees with him, to establish C. A. Parsons and Co. at Heaton, Newcastle, to exploit his inventions in high-speed turbines and generators[2]. Control of the turbine patents remained with Clarke, Chapman, so Parsons embarked on designing turbines which did not infringe the patents. A major change was the adoption of radial flow rather than axial (parallel) steam flow.
1890 Made the first radial flow turbines. These were three sets for New Scotland Yard, one of 16 kW and two of 32 kW. See photo.
1890 The first public power station with a Parsons turbo-generator started operation at Forth Banks Power Station, Newcastle.
1891 A radial flow land turbine is on display at the Discovery Museum, Newcastle, and a radial flow marine steam turbine is in the London Science Museum. See Parsons Turbines: Early Examples
1892 Turbo-alternators installed at Cambridge and Scarborough with efficiency equal to the best reciprocating engines of equivalent power[3].
1893 Description of steam turbine combined with two dynamos on one shaft, presented by C. A. Parsons and Co. to the Engineering Laboratory of Cambridge. Its chief point of interest was that one of the dynamos, designed by Professor Ewing, had a periodicity of 14,000 complete cycles per second at 12,000 rpm.[4]
1894 Parsons formed the Marine Steam Turbine Co to construct the Turbinia and to exploit the marine applications of his turbine.
1899 Description of Parsons' works[5]
1899 Information about Parsons' works and some of the turbines. These included a illustrations of a steam turbine-driven fan for the Clara Vale Colliery, Wylam; a 75 kW turbine-generator, one of four for the Hotel Cecil, London; 350-kilowatt turbo-alternator, one of thirteen of then in use for lighting London at the Metropolitan Company’s stations at Manchester-square, and Sardinia-street; several machines installed at central station of the Newcastle and District Electric Co at Forth Banks. Also mentioned was the manufacture of mirrors for searchlight projectors, and reference to 'A special type of mirror of double curvature, for producing a flat or fan-shaped beam, has been supplied in considerable numbers to meet the Suez Canal requirements, for illuminating the buoys that mark the channel. The beam produced by this peculiar shape of the mirror, is similar to that obtained by the use of an ordinary parabolic mirror in combination with a dispersing lens, but owing to the beam being obtained by a single reflection there is less loss of light[6]
1900 Details and illustration of 500-kW Turbo-Alternator in 'The Engineer'
1904 Turbine generators for Carville 'A', Wallsend. Largest units 6000 HP.
1911 Electrical Exhibition. 6,000 kW turbo alternator set for Randfontein Gold Mining Co of South Africa.
1912 The largest turbo-alternator made to date (25,000kW) was ordered for the Fisk Street station in Chicago[7]. Its design and construction was described in 'Engineering' [8]
1913 Expansion of capacity by purchase of Ernest Scott and Mountain of Gateshead. The business would be continued and assist C.A. Parsons in general manufacture[9].
1913 Private company.
1913 Turbine generator[10]s for Newport 'A' & 'B' power stations, Australia.
With the outbreak of war in 1914, Charles' daughter Rachel Parsons, replaced her brother on the board of directors and worked in the training department of the Ministry of Munitions. She supported hundreds of women who stepped up to work in the industry to support the war effort. See C. A. Parsons and Co: Women of the War.
1914 Engineers and contractors. Specialities: steam turbine dynamos, alternators, blowing engines, compressors, pumps, exhausters, mixed pressure and exhaust steam turbines, searchlight reflectors. Employees 1,200[11].
1922 Turbine generators with total output of 300,000 HP for Barking, London.
1923 Commonwealth Edison Co of Chicago ordered a 50,000kW turbo-alternator for their Crawford Street Power Station[12]. See photo.
1927 One of the UK's major electrical-machinery and plant manufacturers, others beings GEC, BTH, Metropolitan-Vickers, and English Electric Co[13].
1928 Turbine alternators for Brimsdown. 33kV alternator output.
1930 Four 23 MW T/As for Great Indian Peninsular Railway's Kalyan generating station.
1930 C. A. Parsons and Co gained the order to make the blades for the turbines for the new Cunard liner under construction on the Clyde[14] and 12 turbines[15]
1932 Three 67,000 HP T/As ordered for Dunston-on-Tyne. These were last which involved Charle Parsons' design input.
1932 Advert: Steam turbines, turbo-alternators, high-voltage alternators, low speed alternators, direct current generators, static transformers, centrifugal blowers, centrifugal compressors, condensing plant, high speed gears, fabricated steel structures, searchlight reflectors, iron and brass castings, etc[16].
1934 Parolle Electrical Plant Co Ltd acquired the shares in C. A. Parsons and Co from the executors of the estate of the late Sir Charles Parsons[17].
1934 Hollow stainless steel turbine blades developed. Examples fitted on a trial basis on one of the 50 MW turbines at Dunston Power Station and a 30 MW turbine at Brighton Corporation's Southwick Power Station. See illustration of 17in. long blade weighing 1.5 lb, 0.5 lb less than a solid blade of the same dimensions.[18]
1937 Established Savage and Parsons, a private company, with British Instrument Co, A. Reyrolle and Co, Societe Internationale pour le Reclame Aerienne and J. C. Savage, to carry on the business of manufacturers and operators of and dealers in searchlights and projection apparatus, sound locators and detectors, etc[19].
1938 Started experimental work on gas turbine prime mover but work was suspended during WW2[20].
1938 A new company Parolle Electrical Plant Co Ltd formed to take over the contracting business of a company of the same name. The shares in the new company would be held equally by C. A. Parsons and Co and A. Reyrolle and Co. The shares in C. A. Parsons and Co held by the old company have been acquired by A. Reyrolle and Co[21].
WW2: Production of naval and merchant vessel turbine propulsion equipment, guns, radar, and research work for Ministry of Supply and the armed services[22].
c1945 Claude Dixon Gibb appointed chairman and managing director
1946 Considerable investment, company turned over from wartime work, orders for plant; no shortage of labour[23].
1946 Company meeting told that orders for power equipment from abroad exceeded those from home markets but Sir Howard Grubb, Parsons and Co had few orders for large telescopes. Investment in plant and in research. Commercial size experimental gas turbine now under test. Traditions of "reliability, efficiency and service" in electricity generation, as laid down by Charles Parsons, were being maintained[24].
1947 The first industrial gas turbine, a 500 h.p. unit, had been operating at C. A. Parsons and Co's Heaton works for about a year[25].
1947 Annual meeting told of delivery of first 3 turbo-electric propulsion systems for shipping; control gear provided by Reyrolle's. Many orders for power plant. Issue of shares to the public in order to be able to respond to the large increase in demand for the company's products[26]. The company owns 50% of the shares in Parolle Electrical Plant Co and 22% of the shares in Savage and Parsons[27].
1951 A Parsons 100 MW generator was commissioned at Richard L. Hearn station of the Hydro-Electric Power Commission of Ontario. At the time it was probably the largest two-cylinder tandem set yet built in Britain.[28]
1955 Four industrial groups formed to exploit the information being made available by UKAEA on design of nuclear power "furnaces" - Industrial Atomic Energy Group involving AEI and John Thompson with electrical generating expertise from Metropolitan-Vickers and BTH; English Electric Co and Babcock and Wilcox; C. A. Parsons and Co and Head, Wrightson and Co; GEC and Simon-CarvesLtd[29].
Jointly C. A. Parsons and Co and A. Reyrolle and Co had the largest shareholding in the Nuclear Power Plant Co Ltd, the first nuclear consortium to be formed in the U.K.[30].
1959 Recognised that the number of orders for nuclear power plants would be constrained because each one had such large generating capacity. For this reason, Parsons decided to make a move towards rationalisation by joining with the AEI-John Thompson consortium, forming the Nuclear Power Group. Although this caused some loss of work for the constituent companies it meant that, by 1968, the Group was constructing 6 out of 12 nuclear plant ordered in the U.K., and one of two such plant sold abroad[31].
1961 Mechanical and electrical engineers, manufacturing electrical machinery, feed heating plant, condensing plant and turbo blowers and compressors. 8,000 employees. [32]
1965[33]. As a response to the CEGB's policy of restricting orders for turbo-generators to just two designs (when there were 4 manufacturers), C. A. Parsons and Co bought the turbo-generator business of GEC[34]
1966 Acquired the turbo-generators business of GEC in exchange for 18.2 percent of Parsons' equity[35]
1967 Supplied the turbo-generators for Ferrybridge C Power Station.
1967 The company was owned 18.6 percent by AEI, 18.2 percent by GEC, 18.6 percent by A. Reyrolle and Co[36]
1968 The company was acquired by A. Reyrolle and Co to form Reyrolle Parsons, which would be a holding company - the Parsons and Reyrolle subsidiaries would continue to trade under their own names as these are well known in the industry[37]. Reyrolle purchased 37% of the shares from GEC which, with its existing holding, gave it control, and then offered to buy the other 45% which were in public hands[38].
1969 Announced redundancies of 2000 people by end of 1970 at its Erith works (site leased from GEC). Uncertainty about future of the Witton works[39].
1970 Advert: Auction sale of 400 machine tools, 2000 tons of iron work plates, 53 tons stainless iron plate at the Erith turbine works[40]
1977 Clarke, Chapman and Co merged with Reyrolle Parsons of Newcastle to form a new company, Northern Engineering Industries (NEI)
The former C A Parsons works at Heaton is now owned by Siemens, and continues to produce turbine and generator components and carry out overhaul work.
See Also
Sources of Information
- ↑ The Engineer, 11 May 1934
- ↑ Biography of Sir Charles Algernon Parsons, by Claude Gibb, revised by Anita McConnell, ODNB. http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/35396
- ↑ Biography of Sir Charles Algernon Parsons, by Claude Gibb, revised by Anita McConnell, ODNB. http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/35396
- ↑ Engineering 1893/04/07
- ↑ Engineering 1899/08/18
- ↑ Engineering 1899/08/25
- ↑ The Times, 17 January 1923
- ↑ Engineering, 17 Oct 1913
- ↑ The Times, 29 January 1913
- ↑ Engineering 1899/08/18
- ↑ 1914 Whitakers Red Book
- ↑ 'Charles Parsons' by Rollo Appleyard, Constable, 1933
- ↑ A History of the County of Warwick: Volume 7: The City of Birmingham (1964)
- ↑ The Times, 2 September 1930
- ↑ The Times, 23 September 1930
- ↑ The Times, 1 November 1932
- ↑ The Times, 22 January 1934
- ↑ The Engineer 1934/01/12
- ↑ The Times 24 November 1937
- ↑ The Times, 1 January 1947
- ↑ The Times, 17 February 1938
- ↑ The Times, 4 June 1946
- ↑ The Times, 4 June 1946
- ↑ The Times, 1 August 1946
- ↑ The Times, 1 Januray 1947
- ↑ The Times, 16 May 1947
- ↑ The Times, 2 June 1947
- ↑ [1] 'Electricity Supply in the UK: A chronology' Electricity Council, c. 1987
- ↑ The Times, 17 March 1955
- ↑ The Times, 27 May 1968
- ↑ The Times, 27 May 1968
- ↑ 1961 Dun and Bradstreet KBE
- ↑ The Times, 22 February 1969
- ↑ The Times, 27 May 1968
- ↑ The Times Sept. 29, 1967
- ↑ The Times Sept. 29, 1967
- ↑ The Times, 27 May 1968
- ↑ The Times, 21 March 1968
- ↑ The Times, 22 February 1969
- ↑ Birmingham Daily Post - Saturday 26 September 1970