H Building
Historic Environment Record for H BUILDING, Malvern, UK
The building, having military purposes and designated locally as H building, sits on a former Government Research site in Malvern, Worcestershire at Grid Ref SO 786 447. This site was the home of the Telecommunications Research Establishment (TRE) from 1946. It has been owned by QinetiQ since 2001 and is in the process (October 2017 to February 2018) of being sold for redevelopment.
This unique building has at its heart a ‘Rotor’ bunker with attached buildings to house radar screens and operators as well as plant such as emergency generators. Twenty nine Rotor operational underground bunkers were built in great urgency around Britain to modernise the national air defence network, following the Soviet nuclear test in 1949. Two factors make H building’s construction and purpose unique; this prototype is the only Rotor bunker built above ground and it was the home to National Air Defence government research for 30 years.This example of a ROTOR bunker is unique instead of being buried, it was built above ground to save time and expense, as it was not required to be below ground for its research purpose.
H Building was the prototype version of the Rotor project R4 Sector Operations Centre air defence bunkers. Construction began in August 1952 with great urgency - work went on 24 hours a day under arc lights. The main bunker is constructed from cross bonded engineering bricks to
form walls more than 2 feet thick in a rectangle approximately 65ft x 50ft. The two internal floors are suspended from the ceiling. The original surrounding buildings comprise, two radar control and operator rooms, offices and machine plant.
The building was in generally good order and complete. The internal layout of the bunker remains as originally designed. The internal surfaces and services have been maintained and modernised over the 55 years since its construction (Figure 3). The first floor has been closed over.
There are some later external building additions around the periphery to provide additional accommodation.
In parts of the building the suspended floor remains, with 1950s vintage fittings beneath such as patch panels and ventilation ducts.
The building has been empty since the Defence Science & Technology Laboratories [Dstl] moved out in October 2008
As lead for radar research, RRE was responsible for the design of both the replacement radars for the Chain Home radars and the command and control systems for UK National Air Defence.
Project Rotor was based around the Type 80 radar and Type 13 height finder. The first prototype type 80 was built at Malvern in 1953 code named Green Garlic. Live radar feeds against aircraft sorties, were fed into the building to carry out trials of new methods plotting and reporting air activity
A major upgrade of the UK radar network was planned in the late 1950s – Project ‘Linesman’ (military) / ‘Mediator’ (civil) – based around Type 84 / 85 primary radars and the HF200 height finder. A prototype type 85 radar (Blue Yeoman) was built adjacent to H Building in 1959. live radar returns were piped into H Building.
Subsequently a scheme to combine the military and civil radar networks was proposed. The building supported the research for the fully computerised air defence scheme known as Linesman, developed in the 1960s, and a more integrated and flexible system (United Kingdom Air Defence Ground Environment or UKADGE) in the 1970s.
The building was then used for various research purposes until the government relinquished the main site to QinetiQ in 2001. Government scientists continued to use the building until 2008. Throughout its life access was strictly controlled by a dedicated pass sytem.
Notable civil spin-offs from the research in this building include the invention of touch screens and the whole UK Civil Air Traffic Control system which set the standard for Europe.
Chronology
1952 - Construction work is begun. The layout of the bunker area duplicates the underground version built at RAF Bawburgh.
1953 - Construction work is largely completed.
1954 - The building is equipped and ready for experiments.
1956-1958 - Addition of 2nd storey to offices
1957-1960 - Experiments of automatic tracking, novel plot projection systems and data management and communications systems tested.
1960-1970 - Project Linesman mediator experiments carried out including a novel display technique known as a Touch screen ( A World First)
TOUCHSCREEN
A team led by Eric Johnson in H building at Malvern. RRE Tech Note 721 states: This device, the Touch Sensitive Electronic Data Display, or more shortly the ‘Touch Display’, appears to have the potential to provide a very efficient coupling between man and machine. (E A Johnson 1966). See also patent GB 1172222.
Information From Hugh Williams/mraths
1980-1990 - During this period experiments are moved to another building and H building is underused.
1990-1993 - The building was re-purposed and the bunker (room H57) had the first floor closed over to add extra floor area.
2008- The bunker was used until late 2008 for classified research / Joint intelligence centre
2019 - Visual Recording of the buildings interior by MRATHS. Be means of a LIDAR scan and photographs being taken. The exterior was mapped with a drone to allow a 3D Image of the building to be created via Photogrammetry. This was created in Autodesk Photo Recap.
2020 - Building demolished as part of the redevelopment of the site.
Information sourced from MRATHS
H Building
Historic Environment Record for H BUILDING, Malvern, UK
The building, having military purposes and designated locally as H building, sits on a former Government Research site in Malvern, Worcestershire at Grid Ref SO 786 447. This site was the home of the Telecommunications Research Establishment (TRE) from 1946. It has been owned by QinetiQ since 2001 and is in the process (October 2017 to February 2018) of being sold for redevelopment.
This unique building has at its heart a ‘Rotor’ bunker with attached buildings to house radar screens and operators as well as plant such as emergency generators. Twenty nine Rotor operational underground bunkers were built in great urgency around Britain to modernise the national air defence network, following the Soviet nuclear test in 1949. Two factors make H building’s construction and purpose unique; this prototype is the only Rotor bunker built above ground and it was the home to National Air Defence government research for 30 years.This example of a ROTOR bunker is unique instead of being buried, it was built above ground to save time and expense, as it was not required to be below ground for its research purpose.
H Building was the prototype version of the Rotor project R4 Sector Operations Centre air defence bunkers. Construction began in August 1952 with great urgency - work went on 24 hours a day under arc lights. The main bunker is constructed from cross bonded engineering bricks to
form walls more than 2 feet thick in a rectangle approximately 65ft x 50ft. The two internal floors are suspended from the ceiling. The original surrounding buildings comprise, two radar control and operator rooms, offices and machine plant.
The building was in generally good order and complete. The internal layout of the bunker remains as originally designed. The internal surfaces and services have been maintained and modernised over the 55 years since its construction (Figure 3). The first floor has been closed over.
There are some later external building additions around the periphery to provide additional accommodation.
In parts of the building the suspended floor remains, with 1950s vintage fittings beneath such as patch panels and ventilation ducts.
The building has been empty since the Defence Science & Technology Laboratories [Dstl] moved out in October 2008
As lead for radar research, RRE was responsible for the design of both the replacement radars for the Chain Home radars and the command and control systems for UK National Air Defence.
Project Rotor was based around the Type 80 radar and Type 13 height finder. The first prototype type 80 was built at Malvern in 1953 code named Green Garlic. Live radar feeds against aircraft sorties, were fed into the building to carry out trials of new methods plotting and reporting air activity
A major upgrade of the UK radar network was planned in the late 1950s – Project ‘Linesman’ (military) / ‘Mediator’ (civil) – based around Type 84 / 85 primary radars and the HF200 height finder. A prototype type 85 radar (Blue Yeoman) was built adjacent to H Building in 1959. live radar returns were piped into H Building.
Subsequently a scheme to combine the military and civil radar networks was proposed. The building supported the research for the fully computerised air defence scheme known as Linesman, developed in the 1960s, and a more integrated and flexible system (United Kingdom Air Defence Ground Environment or UKADGE) in the 1970s.
The building was then used for various research purposes until the government relinquished the main site to QinetiQ in 2001. Government scientists continued to use the building until 2008. Throughout its life access was strictly controlled by a dedicated pass sytem.
Notable civil spin-offs from the research in this building include the invention of touch screens and the whole UK Civil Air Traffic Control system which set the standard for Europe.
Chronology
1952 - Construction work is begun. The layout of the bunker area duplicates the underground version built at RAF Bawburgh.
1953 - Construction work is largely completed.
1954 - The building is equipped and ready for experiments.
1956-1958 - Addition of 2nd storey to offices
1957-1960 - Experiments of automatic tracking, novel plot projection systems and data management and communications systems tested.
1960-1970 - Project Linesman mediator experiments carried out including a novel display technique known as a Touch screen ( A World First)
TOUCHSCREEN
A team led by Eric Johnson in H building at Malvern. RRE Tech Note 721 states: This device, the Touch Sensitive Electronic Data Display, or more shortly the ‘Touch Display’, appears to have the potential to provide a very efficient coupling between man and machine. (E A Johnson 1966). See also patent GB 1172222.
Information From Hugh Williams/mraths
1980-1990 - During this period experiments are moved to another building and H building is underused.
1990-1993 - The building was re-purposed and the bunker (room H57) had the first floor closed over to add extra floor area.
2008- The bunker was used until late 2008 for classified research / Joint intelligence centre
2019 - Visual Recording of the buildings interior by MRATHS. Be means of a LIDAR scan and photographs being taken. The exterior was mapped with a drone to allow a 3D Image of the building to be created via Photogrammetry. This was created in Autodesk Photo Recap.
2020 - Building demolished as part of the redevelopment of the site.
Information sourced from MRATHS