Grace's Guide To British Industrial History

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Grace's Guide is the leading source of historical information on industry and manufacturing in Britain. This web publication contains 173,091 pages of information and 249,766 images on early companies, their products and the people who designed and built them.

Grace's Guide is the leading source of historical information on industry and manufacturing in Britain. This web publication contains 147,919 pages of information and 233,587 images on early companies, their products and the people who designed and built them.

John Stirk and Sons

From Graces Guide
Lathe. Exhibit at the National Slate Museum.
Lathe. (Detail). Exhibit at the National Slate Museum.
1905. Four spindle drill.
1907.
1907.
1907. Machines shown at Olympia
1928. Hiloplane.
1928. Hilomill.
December 1929.
1934.
1936.
1937.
1937.
1943.
January 1953.
1954.

John Stirk and Sons of Halifax were machine tool makers

1866 Business established by John Stirk.

1894 Greenwood Stirk became a partner

1906 Company incorporated

1907 Machines exhibited at the Olympia engineering exhibition included a small (30" dia. table) vertical boring mill. See illustration.[1]

1920 September. Exhibited at the Machine Tool and Engineering Exhibition at Olympia with electrically operated planer

1927 Detailed description of electrically-driven Hiloplane planing machine weighing 75 tons, able to plane the faces of a block 10ft. wide, 8ft. high and 20ft. long[2]

1930 'The largest planing machine ever exported from this country has just been delivered to the Ateliers Constructions Electriques de Charleroi, Belgium. The machine was built John Stirk and Sons, Halifax; is electrically operated, weighs 110 tons, and can execute work up to a maximum length of 26ft., 12ft. wide, and 11ft. 8in. high.'[3]. This was a plano-milling machine. Motors made by Horace Green and Co.

1938 Description and illustrations of Hiloplane planers [4]

1940 Advert for Hiloplanes and Hiloplows

1945 Advert. Planers

At some point became a wholly-owned subsidiary of Coventry Machine Tool Works

Maker of Stirk planing machines.

1961 Acquired by Wickman[5]

1964 After another difficult year, the businesses of the 2 companies (i.e. Coventry and Stirk) were combined under the name John Stirk and Sons[6]

1984 John Brown and Co sold the Halifax-based machine tools business to James H. Vickery[7]


See Also

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Sources of Information

  1. ↑ Engineering 1907/10/18
  2. ↑ The Engineer 1927/02/18
  3. ↑ Yorkshire Post and Leeds Intelligencer, 1 November 1930
  4. ↑ The Engineer 1938/12/23
  5. ↑ The Times, Aug 11, 1961
  6. ↑ The Times Aug. 11, 1964
  7. ↑ The Times Jun 19, 1984
  • The Engineer of 10th September 1920 p244
  • Mechanical World Year Book 1927. Published by Emmott and Co of Manchester. Advert p
  • Mechanical World Year Book 1940. Published by Emmott and Co of Manchester. Advert p146
  • Mechanical World Year Book 1945. Published by Emmott and Co of Manchester. Advert p180
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