Victorian Lathe
A lathe is a machine tool that rotates the workpiece on its axis to perform various operations such as cutting, sanding, knurling, drilling, or deformation, facing, turning, with tools that are applied to the workpiece to create an object with symmetry about an axis of rotation.
Lathes are used in woodturning, metalworking, metal spinning, thermal spraying, parts reclamation, and glass-working. Lathes can be used to shape pottery, the best-known design being the potter's wheel. Most suitably equipped metalworking lathes can also be used to produce most solids of revolution, plane surfaces and screw threads or helices. Ornamental lathes can produce three-dimensional solids of incredible complexity. The workpiece is usually held in place by either one or two centers, at least one of which can typically be moved horizontally to accommodate varying workpiece lengths. Other work-holding methods include clamping the work about the axis of rotation using a chuck or collet, or to a faceplate, using clamps or dogs.
Examples of objects that can be produced on a lathe include candlestick holders, gun barrels, cue sticks, table legs, bowls, baseball bats, musical instruments (especially woodwind instruments), crankshafts, and camshafts.
This machine was an exhibit in the 'Museum of Bath at Work' at Camden Works, Julian Road, in Bath, Somerset, England. Usually the city of Bath conjures up images of elegant crescents, Beau Nash and Jane Austen, but amid the gentility there have always been pockets of industry - brewers; flour-millers; manufacturers of Plasticine, cars and even gigantic dockyard cranes, and supplying them all with their nuts and bolts from 1872 onwards was the business of Jonathan Burdett Bowler.
As a self-made mechanical engineer, brass-founder, gas fitter, locksmith, bell-hanger, fizzy drink manufacturer and all-round entrepreneur. He founded a family firm, which closed down in 1969; and thanks to the frugal habits he instilled in his children and grandchildren nothing was ever thrown away so the public can now visit this perfect reconstruction of his premises. Cluttered, grubby and glittering with brass, this is an industrial time capsule.
J B Bowler & Sons' final closure was forced by Bath Council's compulsory purchase of the firm's Corn Street site for a multi-storey car park. Luckily, another local businessman, Russell Frears, was so struck by the historical continuity the premises represented that he bought the entire contents of the building, almost one million of them, for £2,000 and founded the Bath Industrial Heritage Trust to preserve them.
Meticulous photographs were taken so that the layout of the works and shop could be duplicated, before everything was stored until a suitable museum building could be found. In 1978, the Bowler business was reconstituted at the Camden Works an interesting building in its own right, having been constructed as a real tennis court in 1777, and later converted into a pin manufactory. One thousand photographs taken of the original business were used in the reconstruction of shop, workshops, offices, bottling plant, etc. Over 10,000 bottles were saved and a collection of half a million documents were also saved.
This museum was established in 1978 to present the commercial development of Bath over the last 2000 years and includes displays on four floors. The main exhibit is this reconstruction of an engineering and mineral water making business set up by Victorian entrepreneur Jonathan Bowler in 1864.
Other reconstructions at the museum include a cabinet maker's workshop and a Bath Stone quarry face complete with crane, tools, etc. In 1999 a rare Horstmann car, built in 1914 was acquired, and, in 2003, a comprehensive exhibition on Bath's development, 'Bath at Work : 2000 Years of Earning a Living' opened. A local history display in the Hudson Gallery opened in 2007 and features an ever changing display of photographs. In 2008 the only known example of a horizontal Griffin cycle gas engine was acquired.
www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/722116/Bath-The-nuts-and-bolts...
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Museum_of_Bath_at_Work
Victorian Lathe
A lathe is a machine tool that rotates the workpiece on its axis to perform various operations such as cutting, sanding, knurling, drilling, or deformation, facing, turning, with tools that are applied to the workpiece to create an object with symmetry about an axis of rotation.
Lathes are used in woodturning, metalworking, metal spinning, thermal spraying, parts reclamation, and glass-working. Lathes can be used to shape pottery, the best-known design being the potter's wheel. Most suitably equipped metalworking lathes can also be used to produce most solids of revolution, plane surfaces and screw threads or helices. Ornamental lathes can produce three-dimensional solids of incredible complexity. The workpiece is usually held in place by either one or two centers, at least one of which can typically be moved horizontally to accommodate varying workpiece lengths. Other work-holding methods include clamping the work about the axis of rotation using a chuck or collet, or to a faceplate, using clamps or dogs.
Examples of objects that can be produced on a lathe include candlestick holders, gun barrels, cue sticks, table legs, bowls, baseball bats, musical instruments (especially woodwind instruments), crankshafts, and camshafts.
This machine was an exhibit in the 'Museum of Bath at Work' at Camden Works, Julian Road, in Bath, Somerset, England. Usually the city of Bath conjures up images of elegant crescents, Beau Nash and Jane Austen, but amid the gentility there have always been pockets of industry - brewers; flour-millers; manufacturers of Plasticine, cars and even gigantic dockyard cranes, and supplying them all with their nuts and bolts from 1872 onwards was the business of Jonathan Burdett Bowler.
As a self-made mechanical engineer, brass-founder, gas fitter, locksmith, bell-hanger, fizzy drink manufacturer and all-round entrepreneur. He founded a family firm, which closed down in 1969; and thanks to the frugal habits he instilled in his children and grandchildren nothing was ever thrown away so the public can now visit this perfect reconstruction of his premises. Cluttered, grubby and glittering with brass, this is an industrial time capsule.
J B Bowler & Sons' final closure was forced by Bath Council's compulsory purchase of the firm's Corn Street site for a multi-storey car park. Luckily, another local businessman, Russell Frears, was so struck by the historical continuity the premises represented that he bought the entire contents of the building, almost one million of them, for £2,000 and founded the Bath Industrial Heritage Trust to preserve them.
Meticulous photographs were taken so that the layout of the works and shop could be duplicated, before everything was stored until a suitable museum building could be found. In 1978, the Bowler business was reconstituted at the Camden Works an interesting building in its own right, having been constructed as a real tennis court in 1777, and later converted into a pin manufactory. One thousand photographs taken of the original business were used in the reconstruction of shop, workshops, offices, bottling plant, etc. Over 10,000 bottles were saved and a collection of half a million documents were also saved.
This museum was established in 1978 to present the commercial development of Bath over the last 2000 years and includes displays on four floors. The main exhibit is this reconstruction of an engineering and mineral water making business set up by Victorian entrepreneur Jonathan Bowler in 1864.
Other reconstructions at the museum include a cabinet maker's workshop and a Bath Stone quarry face complete with crane, tools, etc. In 1999 a rare Horstmann car, built in 1914 was acquired, and, in 2003, a comprehensive exhibition on Bath's development, 'Bath at Work : 2000 Years of Earning a Living' opened. A local history display in the Hudson Gallery opened in 2007 and features an ever changing display of photographs. In 2008 the only known example of a horizontal Griffin cycle gas engine was acquired.
www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/722116/Bath-The-nuts-and-bolts...
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Museum_of_Bath_at_Work