Cast iron could be cast in molds for larger parts, such as engine cylinders and gears, but was difficult to work with a file and could not be hammered. Red hot wrought iron could be hammered into shapes. Room temperature wrought iron was worked with a file and chisel and could be made into gears and other complex parts; however, hand working lacked precision and was a slow and expensive process.
History
Machine tool
Machine tool | History
Leonardo da Vinci Leonardo da Vinci Leonardo da Vinci Leonardo da Vinci
when was the first man made diamond made
user
1954
assistant
what are the materials required to make this?
user
Pure carbon, the belt press, the cubic press and the split-sphere (BARS) press.
assistant
what temperature-pressure conditions are required fopr this?
user
High pressure, high temperature.
assistant
can you mention any of its uses?
user
Machine tools and cutting tools; as a Thermal conductor; as an Optical material; semiconductors ; gemstones
assistant
what is the first one?
user
A machine for handling or machining metal or other rigid materials, usually by cutting, boring, grinding, shearing, or other forms of deformation
assistant
can you provide me the historical background for such tools?
user
Forerunners of machine tools included bow drills and potter's wheels, which had existed in ancient Egypt prior to 2500 BC, and lathes, known to have existed in multiple regions of Europe since at least 1000 to 500 BC.
assistant
can you name any prominent figure involved in this background?
user
Forerunners of machine tools included bow drills and potter's wheels, which had existed in ancient Egypt prior to 2500 BC, and lathes, known to have existed in multiple regions of Europe since at least 1000 to 500 BC. But it was not until the later Middle Ages and the Age of Enlightenment that the modern concept of a machine tool—a class of machines used as tools in the making of metal parts, and incorporating machine-guided toolpath—began to evolve. Clockmakers of the Middle Ages and renaissance men such as Leonardo da Vinci helped expand humans' technological milieu toward the preconditions for industrial machine tools.
Machine tool | History
During the 18th and 19th centuries, and even in many cases in the 20th, the builders of machine tools tended to be the same people who would then use them to produce the end products (manufactured goods). However, from these roots also evolved an industry of machine tool builders as we define them today, meaning people who specialize in building machine tools for sale to others. Historians of machine tools often focus on a handful of major industries that most spurred machine tool development. In order of historical emergence, they have been firearms (small arms and artillery); clocks; textile machinery; steam engines (stationary, marine, rail, and otherwise) (the story of how Watt's need for an accurate cylinder spurred Boulton's boring machine is discussed by Roe); sewing machines; bicycles; automobiles; and aircraft.
Machine tool | History
The original assignor was a firm called Maschinenfabrik Michael Kampf KG. A photo of this machine can be seen at Turati Lombardi's history page.
Guilloché | History
Others, such as Henry Maudslay, James Nasmyth, and Joseph Whitworth, soon followed the path of expanding their entrepreneurship from manufactured end products and millwright work into the realm of building machine tools for sale. in the 1830s James Nasmyth had "somewhat to his surprise... discovered, that there was really a market emerging for readymade lathes, planers, drills and flat banks. That demand partly originated from the people building the Lancashire textile machinery, and partly from the new phenomenon: the railways. The fast-growing rail network had locomotives, equipped repair shops, tracks and more demands."
Machine factory | History
Partly due to the precision requirements of his locks, Bramah spent much time developing machine tools to assist manufacturing processes. He relied heavily on the expertise of Henry Maudslay whom he employed in his workshop from the age of 18. Between them they created a number of innovative machines that made the production of Bramah's locks more efficient, and were applicable to other fields of manufacture. Just before Bramah died, his workshops also employed Joseph Clement who among other things made several contributions in the field of lathe design.
Joseph Bramah | Machine tools
In the early 20th century, Joseph Wickham Roe wrote a seminal classic of machine tool history, "English and American Tool Builders" (1916), which is extensively cited by later works. About 20 years later Roe published a biography of James Hartness (1937) that also contains some general history of the industry. In 1947, Fred H. Colvin published a memoir, "Sixty Years with Men and Machines", that contains quite a bit of general history of the industry. L. T. C. Rolt's 1965 monograph, "A Short History of Machine Tools", is a widely read classic, as are the series of monographs that Robert S.
Machine tool builder | Historical studies of machine tool building
Maudslay laid an important foundation for the Industrial Revolution with his machine tool technology. His most influential invention was the screw-cutting lathe. The machine, which created uniformity in screws and allowed for the application of interchangeable parts (a prerequisite for mass production), was a revolutionary development necessary for the Industrial Revolution. Many outstanding engineers trained in his workshop, including Richard Roberts, David Napier, Joseph Clement, Sir Joseph Whitworth, James Nasmyth (inventor of the steam hammer), Joshua Field. Maudslay played his part in the development of mechanical engineering when it was in its infancy, but he was especially pioneering in the development of machine tools to be used in engineering workshops across the world.
Henry Maudslay | Legacy
The screw, the last of the simple machines to be invented, first appeared in Mesopotamia during the Neo-Assyrian period (911-609) BC. The Egyptian pyramids were built using three of the six simple machines, the inclined plane, the wedge, and the lever, to create structures like the Great Pyramid of Giza. The earliest civil engineer known by name is Imhotep. As one of the officials of the Pharaoh, Djosèr, he probably designed and supervised the construction of the Pyramid of Djoser (the Step Pyramid) at Saqqara in Egypt around 2630–2611 BC. The earliest practical water-powered machines, the water wheel and watermill, first appeared in the Persian Empire, in what are now Iraq and Iran, by the early 4th century BC.
Engineering | Ancient era
James Fox, (fl. 1780–1830), machine tool maker, was originally a butler in the service of the Rev. Thomas Gisborne, of Foxhall Lodge, Staffordshire. He had a strong interest in handicraft and his employer not only encouraged him, but enabled him to set up in business on his own account. The growth and extension of the cotton, silk, lace and hosiery trades, in the district of Derby, created a great demand for skilled machine-makers and provided Fox with opportunities and he soon found ample scope for employment. His lace machinery became celebrated, and he supplied it largely to the neighbouring town of Nottingham; he also obtained considerable employment from the great firms of Arkwright and Strutt –– the founders of the modern cotton manufacture.
James Fox (engineer) | Introduction
The machine tool industry began gradually in the early nineteenth century with individual toolmakers who innovated in machine tool design and building. The ones that history remembers best include Henry Maudslay, Joseph Whitworth, Joseph Clement, James Nasmyth, Matthew Murray, Elisha K. Root, Frederick W. Howe, Stephen Fitch, J.D. Alvord, Frederick W. Howe, Richard S. Lawrence, Henry D. Stone, Christopher M. Spencer, Amos Whitney, and Francis A. Pratt. The industry then grew into the earliest corporate builders such as Brown & Sharpe, the Warner & Swasey Company, and the original Pratt & Whitney company. In all of these cases, there were product manufacturers who started building machine tools to suit their own inhouse needs, and eventually found that machine tools had become product lines in their own right.
Machine tool builder | History
He had gained skills in turning, wheel-wrighting and the repair of mill-work. He was drawn for the militia and to avoid this made for Liverpool, but finding no work there shifted to Manchester, where he found work as a turner for a cabinet-maker. He then moved to Salford working at lathe- and tool-making. Because the militia was still seeking him, he walked to London, where he found employment with Henry Maudslay as a fitter and turner. At Maudslay's he absorbed his master's philosophy of "the importance of accurate machine tools where hand-work was replaced by mechanisms".
Richard Roberts (engineer) | Early life
Henry Maudslay (pronunciation and spelling) (22 August 1771 – 14 February 1831) was an English machine tool innovator, tool and die maker, and inventor. He is considered a founding father of machine tool technology. His inventions were an important foundation for the Industrial Revolution. Maudslay's invention of a metal lathe to cut metal, circa 1800, enabled the manufacture of standard screw thread sizes. Standard screw thread sizes allowed interchangeable parts and the development of mass production.
Henry Maudslay | Introduction
In the period up to 1856, the foundry concentrated on building a large number of machine tools. Before Nasmyth, machine tools were custom built on demand. Nasmyth published a catalogue of standard designs which he then marketed. His design for the steam hammer was produced first in France by Le Creusot, another firm. On seeing it, Nasmyth then ensured that it was correctly patented. He produced a complete range of steam hammers, planers and shapers. He designed and produced pile drivers and a hydraulic press.
Nasmyth, Gaskell and Company | Machine tools
The lever was also used in the shadoof water-lifting device, the first crane machine, which appeared in Mesopotamia circa 3000 BC, and then in ancient Egyptian technology circa 2000 BC. The earliest evidence of pulleys date back to Mesopotamia in the early 2nd millennium BC, and ancient Egypt during the Twelfth Dynasty (1991-1802 BC). The screw, the last of the simple machines to be invented, first appeared in Mesopotamia during the Neo-Assyrian period (911-609) BC. The Egyptian pyramids were built using three of the six simple machines, the inclined plane, the wedge, and the lever, to create structures like the Great Pyramid of Giza.
History of mechanical engineering | Dawn of civilization to early Antiquity
Some of the key men in milling machine development during this era included Frederick W. Howe, Francis A. Pratt, Elisha K. Root, and others. (These same men during the same era were also busy developing the state of the art in turret lathes. Howe's experience at Gay & Silver in the 1840s acquainted him with early versions of both machine tools. His machine tool designs were later built at Robbins & Lawrence, the Providence Tool Company, and Brown & Sharpe.) The most successful milling machine design to emerge during this era was the , which rather than being a specific make and model of machine tool is truly a family of tools built by various companies on a common configuration over several decades.
Milling (machining) | 1840s–1860
In the mid-20th century, French archaeologist François Bordes debated against American archaeologist Lewis Binford to explain this diversity (the "Bordes–Binford debate"), with Bordes arguing that these represent unique ethnic traditions and Binford that they were caused by varying environments (essentially, form vs. function). The latter sentiment would indicate a lower degree of inventiveness compared to modern humans, adapting the same tools to different environments rather than creating new technologies. A continuous sequence of occupation is well-documented in Grotte du Renne, France, where the lithic tradition can be divided into the Levallois–Charentian, Discoid–Denticulate (43.3±0.929–40.9±0.719 thousand years ago), Levallois Mousterian (40.2±1.5–38.4±1.3 thousand years ago), and Châtelperronian (40.93±0.393–33.67±0.450 thousand years ago).
Neanderthal | Tool manufacturing
Early planing ideas are known to have been underway in France in the 1750s. In the late 1810s, a variety of pioneers in various British shops (including James Fox, George Rennie, Matthew Murray, Joseph Clement, and Richard Roberts) developed the planer into what we today would call a machine tool. The exact details have been contentious and will probably never be known, because the development work being done in various shops was undocumented for various reasons (partially because of proprietary secrecy, and also simply because no one was taking down records for posterity). Roe (1916) provides a short chapter that tells the story as thoroughly as he was able to discover it.
Planer (metalworking) | History
Others could be included in this list as well, but they tend to be connected with the root causes already listed. For example, rolling-element bearings are an industry of themselves, but this industry's main drivers of development were the vehicles already listed—trains, bicycles, automobiles, and aircraft; and other industries, such as tractors, farm implements, and tanks, borrowed heavily from those same parent industries. Machine tools filled a need created by textile machinery during the Industrial Revolution in England in the middle to late 1700s. Until that time, machinery was made mostly from wood, often including gearing and shafts. The increase in mechanization required more metal parts, which were usually made of cast iron or wrought iron.
Machine tool | History
Some of Couvreux's machines were used in the early failed French attempt to build the Panama Canal. The bucket chain excavator is still used in open pit mines and quarries. A scale model of one of his 1859 machines is located in the Museum of Arts and Trades in Paris.
Alphonse Couvreux | Introduction
Most companies in countries as England, France and Germany kept making their own special tools and machines. Lintsen recalled that "only shortly before 1850, there is clear evidence of success in the effort to build 'machines with machines'. A number of so-called machine tools - lathes, planers, drills, cutters - gained the degree of accuracy needed to produce larger series of interchangeable parts. But even these standardization of parts did not mean the end of the individual craftsmanship in the machine industry." The first machine tools offered for sale (i.e., commercially available) were constructed by Matthew Murray in England around 1800.
Machine factory | History
1070–1125) who records applying the device in several of his machines.
Flywheel | History
They were rediscovered by Guillaume Amontons (1699) and were further developed by Charles-Augustin de Coulomb (1785).
Simple machine | History
Among the drawings of Leonardo da Vinci is a sketch of a machine tool for the cutting of files (the chisel would make one strike, swaging a tooth, then automatically advance into position for the next tooth, and strike again).
File (tool) | History
Fifty years later in a woodworking machinery patent case the Crown Judges said "the specification of his patent of 1793 is a perfect treatise on the subject; indeed the only one worth quoting that has to this day been written on the subject". Marc Isambard Brunel had independently conceived designs for mortising and boring machines, which he showed to Bentham, who recognized the superiority of Brunel's designs. Henry Maudslay, the mechanic who built the machines, became a prominent machine tool builder. The Portsmouth Block Mills marked the arrival of mass production techniques in British manufacturing.
Samuel Bentham | Inspector General of Naval Works
Mumford draws an homology between this social structure and physical tools like the wheel, not only in their productive function but also in their physical power: "By operating as a single mechanical unit of specialized, subdivided, interlocking parts, the 100,000 men who worked on that pyramid could generate ten thousand horsepower". He uses the term 'Megamachine' to describe the social and bureaucratic structure that enabled a ruler to coordinate a huge workforce to undertake such vast and complex projects. Where the projects were public works such as irrigation systems and canals or the construction of cities, Mumford referred to the "labour machine", and where they involved conquest he used the expression "military machine".
The Myth of the Machine | Megamachine
Many historians of technology consider that true machine tools were born when the toolpath first became guided by the machine itself in some way, at least to some extent, so that direct, freehand human guidance of the toolpath (with hands, feet, or mouth) was no longer the only guidance used in the cutting or forming process. In this view of the definition, the term, arising at a time when all tools up till then had been hand tools, simply provided a label for "tools that were machines instead of hand tools". Early lathes, those prior to the late medieval period, and modern woodworking lathes and potter's wheels may or may not fall under this definition, depending on how one views the headstock spindle itself; but the earliest historical records of a lathe with direct mechanical control "of the cutting tool's path" are of a screw-cutting lathe dating to about 1483.
Machine tool | Nomenclature and key concepts, interrelated
Apart from the steam hammer, Nasmyth created several other important machine tools, including the shaper, an adaptation of the planer which is still used in tool and die making. Another innovation was a hydraulic press which used water pressure to force tight-fitting machine parts together. All of these machines became popular in manufacturing, and all are still in use in modified form. Nasmyth was also one of the first toolmakers to offer a standardised range of machine tools; before this, manufacturers constructed tools according to individual clients' specifications with little regard to standardisation, which caused compatibility problems. Nasmyth was arguably the last of the early pioneers of the machine tool industry.
James Nasmyth | Other inventions
The lever was used in the shadoof water-lifting device, the first crane machine, which appeared in Mesopotamia circa 3000 BC. and then in ancient Egyptian technology circa 2000 BC. The earliest evidence of pulleys date back to Mesopotamia in the early 2nd millennium BC.
History of technology | Mesopotamia
Abdaraxus was an ancient engineer mentioned in "Laterculi Alexandrini" as the one "who built the machines in Alexandria". This is the only known mention of his name in surviving literature, but to include him in his list, and to consider the machines famous enough to not need elaboration, it has been inferred that Abdaraxus was an outstanding engineer of his time.
Abdaraxus | Introduction
Joseph Wickham Roe (1871 - 1960) was an American engineer and Professor of Industrial Engineering at the New York University, known for his seminal work on machine tools and machine tool builders history.
Joseph Wickham Roe | Introduction
However, the Greeks' understanding was limited to statics (the balance of forces) and did not include dynamics (the tradeoff between force and distance) or the concept of work.
Machine | History
He then moved to London where he found employment working for Henry Maudslay, the inventor of the screw-cutting lathe, alongside such people as James Nasmyth (inventor of the steam hammer) and Richard Roberts. Whitworth developed great skill as a mechanic while working for Maudslay, developing various precision machine tools and also introducing a box casting scheme for the iron frames of machine tools that simultaneously increased their rigidity and reduced their weight. Whitworth also worked for Holtzapffel & Co (makers of lathes used primarily for ornamental turning) and Joseph Clement. While at Clement's workshop he helped with the manufacture of Charles Babbage's calculating machine, the Difference engine.
Joseph Whitworth | Career
Blanchard then turned his attention to gun barrels, and invented a machine tool that streamlined the process of their manufacture. Hired by the Springfield Armory during its construction, Blanchard finished the machine in 1822. The machine turned and finished gun barrels in a single operation; the octagon portion of the barrel was finished by changing the action of the lathe to vibratory motion. This invention was afterward extended to the turning of all kinds of irregular forms. He also developed a copying lathe that traced a model to turn gun stocks, producing the desired contour automatically (1818). The copying lathe began being used to make shoe lasts (forms) in the 1850s.
Thomas Blanchard (inventor) | Machine tools for gun making and pattern copying lathe
The first substantial political controversy in which Roach was engaged arose from his sale of surplus machine tools from the Etna Iron Works to the Philadelphia Navy Yard in 1867. This sale raised the ire of two specialist Philadelphian machine tool manufacturers, William Sellers & Co. and Bement and Dougherty, both of whom had expected to be awarded the contract themselves. The two firms contacted their Congressional representative, William D. Kelley, who quickly raised the matter in Congress on behalf of his constituents. Kelley was appointed Chairman of a subcommittee to investigate the Roach contract. In support of claims that the contract had been awarded as a result of political favoritism, Kelley produced two compliant experts who were prepared to testify against the quality of Roach's tools.
John Roach (shipbuilder) | Machine tools
The lever mechanism first appeared around 5,000 years ago in the Near East, where it was used in a simple balance scale, and to move large objects in ancient Egyptian technology. The lever was also used in the shadoof water-lifting device, the first crane machine, which appeared in Mesopotamia circa 3000 BC, and then in ancient Egyptian technology circa 2000 BC. The earliest evidence of pulleys date back to Mesopotamia in the early 2nd millennium BC, and ancient Egypt during the Twelfth Dynasty (1991-1802 BC). The screw, the last of the simple machines to be invented, first appeared in Mesopotamia during the Neo-Assyrian period (911-609) BC.
History of engineering | Ancient era
The points and sides of their tools indicate a "Moustero-Levalloisian" element. They seemed to have a masterful knowledge of Upper Palaeolithic technology, producing blades as much as fifteen centimeters long.
Ordos Plateau | History
The application of mechanical engineering can be seen in the archives of various ancient and medieval societies. The six classic simple machines were known in the ancient Near East. The wedge and the inclined plane (ramp) were known since prehistoric times. The wheel, along with the wheel and axle mechanism, was invented in Mesopotamia (modern Iraq) during the 5th millennium BC. The lever mechanism first appeared around 5,000 years ago in the Near East, where it was used in a simple balance scale, and to move large objects in ancient Egyptian technology. The lever was also used in the shadoof water-lifting device, the first crane machine, which appeared in Mesopotamia circa 3000 BC.
Mechanical engineering | History
The saddle was driven by a screw through gearing which could be disengaged when the end of the cut was reached. Also in 1817 he built a planing machine to allow the machining of flat surfaces. Previous to this flat surfaces were laboriously made by hand with the fitter using hammers and chisels, files and scrapers to get a true surface. Following the success of his power loom, in 1825 he invented a slotting machine to cut keyways in gears and pulleys to fasten them to their shafts. Previously this was done by hand chipping and filing. The tool was reciprocated vertically, and by adopting Maudslay's slide rest principle, he made the work table with a universal movement, both straight line and rotary so that the sides of complex pieces could be machined.
Richard Roberts (engineer) | Roberts' machine tools
“all the turning of the iron for the cotton machinery built by Mr. Slater was done with hand chisels or tools in lathes turned by cranks with hand power”. David Wilkinson Machine tools can be powered from a variety of sources. Human and animal power (via cranks, treadles, treadmills, or treadwheels) were used in the past, as was water power (via water wheel); however, following the development of high-pressure steam engines in the mid 19th century, factories increasingly used steam power. Factories also used hydraulic and pneumatic power. Many small workshops continued to use water, human and animal power until electrification after 1900.
Machine tool | Drive power sources
The result of ten years work, this machine was able to add, subtract, divide, multiply and obtain a square root. The machine earned a silver medal at this exhibition.
Izrael Abraham Staffel | Introduction
In a poem by Ausonius in the 4th century AD, he mentions a stone-cutting saw powered by water. Hero of Alexandria is credited with many such wind and steam powered machines in the 1st century AD, including the Aeolipile and the vending machine, often these machines were associated with worship, such as animated altars and automated temple doors.
Engine | Antiquity
The Egyptian pyramids were built using three of the six simple machines, the inclined plane, the wedge, and the lever, to create structures like the Great Pyramid of Giza. Three of the simple machines were studied and described by Greek philosopher Archimedes around the 3rd century BC: the lever, pulley and screw. Archimedes discovered the principle of mechanical advantage in the lever. Later Greek philosophers defined the classic five simple machines (excluding the inclined plane) and were able to roughly calculate their mechanical advantage. Heron of Alexandria (ca. 10–75 AD) in his work "Mechanics" lists five mechanisms that can "set a load in motion"; lever, windlass, pulley, wedge, and screw, and describes their fabrication and uses.
Machine | History
The Holtzapffel dynasty of tool and lathe makers was founded in Long Acre, London by a Strasbourg-born turner, Jean-Jacques Holtzapffel, in 1794. The firm specialized in lathes for ornamental turning but also made a name for its high-quality edge and boring tools.
Holtzapffel | Introduction
Later he developed the shaping machine, where the cutting tool was reciprocated horizontally over the work, which could be moved in all directions by means of screw-driven slides. Examples of his machine tools, including the oldest existing metal planer, are in the collections of the National Museum of Science and Industry, London. Roberts also manufactured and sold sets of stocks and dies to his range of pitches, so other engineers could cut threads on nuts and bolts and other machine parts. Roberts' inventions had a seminal influence on other machine-tool engineers, including Joseph Whitworth, when he came to Manchester, a decade later.
Richard Roberts (engineer) | Roberts' machine tools
In the mid-12th century, casting surpassed hammering as the principal technique for modeling in metal. The process of bronze casting outlined by Theophilus around 1100 gives a clear sense of the kind of work Nicholas performed. Casting allowed for greater freedom of movement and gesture of figures.
Nicholas of Verdun | Historical background
The lever mechanism first appeared around 5,000 years ago in the Near East, where it was used in a simple balance scale, and to move large objects in ancient Egyptian technology. The lever was also used in the shadoof water-lifting device, the first crane machine, which appeared in Mesopotamia circa 3000 BC, and then in ancient Egyptian technology circa 2000 BC. The earliest evidence of pulleys date back to Mesopotamia in the early 2nd millennium BC, and ancient Egypt during the Twelfth Dynasty (1991-1802 BC). The screw, the last of the simple machines to be invented, first appeared in Mesopotamia during the Neo-Assyrian period (911-609) BC.
Machine | History
The Herodotus Machine was a machine described by Herodotus, a Greek historian born in Halicarnassus, Caria (modern-day Bodrum, Turkey). Herodotus claims this invention enabled the ancient Egyptians to construct the pyramids. The contraption supposedly allowed workers to lift heavy building materials. Herodotus is believed to have encountered the device while traveling through Egypt. With limited reference and no true schematics, this machine has stimulated many historians' theories of how the ancient Egyptians were able to create pyramids.
Herodotus Machine | Introduction
By being able to accurately reproduce lasts it was possible to make shoes in standard sizes.
Thomas Blanchard (inventor) | Machine tools for gun making and pattern copying lathe
Roberts built a range of machine tools, some to his own design, the first being a gear-cutting machine. For accurately checking the dimensions of the gears he adapted the sector, which he developed for sale to other engineers. Roberts adopted rotary cutters, which he had seen used at Maudslays. This is one of the earliest records of a milling cutter used in engineering. In 1816 he made the first reliable wet gas meter. In 1817 he made a lathe able to turn work . This had a back gear to give an increased range of speeds, and a sliding saddle to move the tool along the work.
Richard Roberts (engineer) | Roberts' machine tools
David Wilkinson (January 5, 1771 – February 3, 1852) was a U.S. mechanical engineer who invented a lathe for cutting screw threads, which was extremely important in the development of the machine tool industry in the early 19th century.
David Wilkinson (machinist) | Introduction
He led the development of the company's multiple-spindle brand machine that became an important automatic lathe in the mass production of parts for the automotive industry. He was president of the company for 40 years, through World War I, the interwar period, and World War II, a period during which the Bullard company was the largest machine tool builder in the U.S., and vast volumes of military matériel were produced by countless companies running Bullard machines.
Edward P. Bullard Jr. | Introduction
The recognised excellence of Clement's machine tools and his skill in precision engineering led to him being employed by Charles Babbage in 1823 to work on his project to design and build his mechanical calculating device, the difference engine. The high prices of his large precision tools led to a falling out with Babbage (at the time workmen were allowed to keep any tools made by them in the course of their work), but his skill and the quality of his products kept him in employment for many years.
Joseph Clement | Involvement with Charles Babbage
Lincoln & Company of Hartford, Connecticut, which became the Lincoln miller, in some ways perhaps the most important American machine tool of the late 19th century. Over 150,000 machines were built on this form factor (by many firms). Pratt cofounded the Pratt & Whitney company along with Amos Whitney in 1860. Their first product was a thread winder for the Willimantic Linen Company. They went on to manufacture machine tools, tools for the makers of sewing machines, and gun making machinery for use by the Union Army during the American Civil War. He is credited with being first to permit production of fine gear work.
Francis A. Pratt | Biography
Various machine elements that potentially lent themselves to screw making (such as the lathe, the leadscrew, the slide rest, gears, slide rests geared direct to spindles, and "change gear" gear trains) were developed over the centuries, with some of those elements being quite ancient. Various sparks of inventive power during the Middle Ages and Renaissance combined some of these elements into screw-making machines that presaged the industrial era to follow. For example, various medieval inventors whose names are lost to history clearly worked on the problem, as shown by Wolfegg Castle's "Medieval Housebook" (written circa 1475–1490), and Leonardo da Vinci and Jacques Besson left us with drawings of screw-cutting machines from the 1500s; not all of these designs are known to have been built, but clearly similar machines were a reality during Besson's lifetime.
Automatic lathe | History
Woodbury published during the 1960s, which were collected into a volume in 1972 as "Studies in the History of Machine Tools". In 1970, Wayne R. Moore wrote about the Moore family firm, the Moore Special Tool Company, who independently invented the jig borer (contemporaneously with its Swiss invention). Moore's monograph, "Foundations of Mechanical Accuracy", is a seminal classic of the principles of machine tool design and construction that yield the highest possible accuracy and precision in machine tools (second only to that of metrological machines). The Moore firm epitomized the art and science of the tool and die maker.
Machine tool builder | Historical studies of machine tool building
Roach realized the importance of political influence during this period, and secured the services of lawyer William E. Chandler who became his chief Washington lobbyist. Roach also became a generous donor to the Republican Party.
John Roach (shipbuilder) | Machine tools
Some important tool-builders in this development were Stephen Fitch; Gay, Silver & Co.; Elisha K. Root of Colt; J.D. Alvord of the Sharps Armory; Frederick W. Howe, Richard S. Lawrence, and Henry D. Stone of Robbins & Lawrence; J.R. Brown of Brown & Sharpe; and Francis A. Pratt of Pratt & Whitney. Various designers at these and other firms later made further refinements.
Turret lathe | Archetypical: horizontal, manual
The Churchill Machine Tool Co staff included some distinguished names: Herbert (Harry) Hales Asbridge (d. 12 Jul 1946) is credited with numerous patents, assigned to the company, during his time working there and had been awarded the MBE for industry-related services during the period 1914–18. Sir Greville Simpson Maginness (b. 1888 – d. 23 Nov 1961), Kt. 1947, KBE 1953 was a lead delegate for the employers at the first Conference of the ILO in Washington (1919), President of the Engineering and Allied Employers' National Federation (1944–46), President of the Russo-British Chamber of Commerce from 1938 until his death and a member of the Engineering Advisory Council, Ministry of Supply (1946–61); he became President of the British Employers' Confederation, a forerunner of the CBI, in December 1946, when he was chairman and managing director of The Churchill Machine Tool Co Ltd.
The Churchill Machine Tool Company | Notable staff
Julien Offray de La Mettrie (; November 23, 1709 – November 11, 1751) was a French physician and philosopher, and one of the earliest of the French materialists of the Enlightenment. He is best known for his work "L'homme machine" ("Machine Man").
Julien Offray de La Mettrie | Introduction
His cutting experiments chewed through tons of workpiece material, consumed thousands of tool bits, and generated mountains of chips. They were sponsored in large part by William Sellers (a principal of Midvale Steel and Cramp's shipyard) and later by Bethlehem Steel. Not only did Taylor develop new materials to make single-point cutters from, but he also determined optimum geometry (rake angles, clearance angles, nose radiuses, etc.). He developed Taylor's Equation for Tool Life Expectancy. After Taylor, it was no longer taken for granted that the black art of individual craftsmen represented the highest level of metalworking technology. This was part of a larger trend during the 19th and 20th centuries by which science was mixed with art in the material culture of everyday life (applied science).
Tool bit | History
Herodotus provides a description of the process in Histories. Leonardo da Vinci is believed to have sketched a machine based on Herodotus' description. Later depictions are premised upon da Vinci's sketches in the Codex Madrid. Visual depictions cannot authoritatively claim to represent Herodotus' machine. Some scholars argue that da Vinci may have had access to ancient texts, since lost, that provided additional details. Since Herodotus provides more of a description of the components of the design rather than detailed form or usage, many ideas have been put forward and scale models built.
Herodotus Machine | Herodotus' description
The Egyptian pyramids were built using three of the six simple machines, the inclined plane, the wedge, and the lever, to create structures like the Great Pyramid of Giza. The earliest architect known by name is Imhotep. As one of the officials of the Pharaoh, Djosèr, he probably designed and supervised the construction of the Pyramid of Djoser (a Step Pyramid) at Saqqara in Egypt around 2630-2611 BC. He may also have been responsible for the first known use of columns in architecture.
History of engineering | Ancient era
Toussaint-Henry-Joseph Fafchamps (1783-1868), sometimes spelled Fafschamps, was a Belgian Army captain. In 1851, with the Belgian gunsmith Joseph Montigny and the Fusnot company, he developed what is sometimes considered the first machine gun in history, 10 years before the advent of the Gatling gun.
Toussaint-Henry-Joseph Fafchamps | Introduction
These machines and the block mills attracted an enormous amount of interest from the time of their erection, ranging from Admiral Lord Nelson on the morning of the day he embarked from Portsmouth for the Battle of Trafalgar on 1805, to the Princess Victoria at the age of 12, as part of her education. Even during the time of the Napoleonic Wars, until 1815 there was a stream of foreign dignitaries and military men wishing to learn. The machines were fully described and illustrated in the "Edinburgh Encyclopædia" (1811), "Rees's Cyclopædia", (1812), the supplement to the 4th edition of" Encyclopædia Britannica" (1817) and the "Encyclopædia Metropolitana".
Portsmouth Block Mills | Publicity
The innovation spread to other mills and breweries. Probably the earliest industrial example of a linear and continuous assembly process is the Portsmouth Block Mills, built between 1801 and 1803. Marc Isambard Brunel (father of Isambard Kingdom Brunel), with the help of Henry Maudslay and others, designed 22 types of machine tools to make the parts for the rigging blocks used by the Royal Navy. This factory was so successful that it remained in use until the 1960s, with the workshop still visible at HM Dockyard in Portsmouth, and still containing some of the original machinery.
Assembly line | Industrial Revolution
The origins of the cylindrical grinder, as with all other modern machine tools, stem from the experimentation and invention of John Wilkinson and later Henry Maudslay who built the first horizontal boring machine and the first engine lathe, respectively. The cylindrical grinder owes much of its development from the onset of the Industrial Revolution, particularly to the advent of reliable, inexpensive steel production and later the improvement of the grinding wheel. The basis for the modern day cylindrical grinder was first built in the 1830s by two men working independently, Jonathan Bridges and James Wheaton . It is unclear as to which man had first produced the machine but both are closely tied to the first historical appearance of the modern day tool.
Cylindrical grinder | History
An early instance of transition from skilled craftsmen to machine tools began in the late eighteenth century. In 1774, John Wilkinson invented a method for boring cannon barrels that were straight and true every time. He adapted this method to bore piston cylinders in the steam engines of James Watt. This boring machine has been called the first machine tool. Mass production using interchangeable parts was first achieved in 1803 by Marc Isambard Brunel in cooperation with Henry Maudslay, and Simon Goodrich, under the management of (with contributions by) Brigadier-General Sir Samuel Bentham, the Inspector General of Naval Works at Portsmouth Block Mills at Portsmouth Dockyard, for the British Royal Navy during the Napoleonic War.
Factory system | Machine tools and interchangeable parts
Brown & Sharpe was instrumental in the development of machine tools and machining technology (including toolmaking, metrology, production, etc.). It was responsible for the improvement and wider dissemination of milling machines, micrometers, turret lathes, screw machines, and other tools. A thorough account of the details is given in a seminal classic of machine tool history, Joseph W. Roe's "English and American Tool Builders" (1916).
Brown &amp; Sharpe | Growth and expansion
It is clear that milling machines as a distinct class of machine tool (separate from lathes running rotary files) first appeared between 1814 and 1818. The centers of earliest development of true milling machines were two federal armories of the U.S. (Springfield and Harpers Ferry) together with the various private armories and inside contractors that shared turnover of skilled workmen with them. Between 1912 and 1916, Joseph W. Roe, a respected founding father of machine tool historians, credited Eli Whitney (one of the private arms makers mentioned above) with producing the first true milling machine. By 1918, he considered it "Probably the first milling machine ever built—certainly the oldest now in existence […]." However, subsequent scholars, including Robert S.
Milling (machining) | 1810s–1830s
He returned to Openshaw, Manchester, in 1833 to start his own business manufacturing lathes and other machine tools, which became renowned for their high standard of workmanship. Whitworth is attributed with the introduction of the thou in 1844. In 1853, along with his lifelong friend, artist and art educator George Wallis (1811–1891), he was appointed a British commissioner for the New York International Exhibition. They toured around industrial sites of several American states, and the result of their journey was a report 'The Industry of the United States in Machinery, Manufactures and Useful and Applied Arts, compiled from the Official Reports of Messrs Whitworth and Wallis, London, 1854.' In 1850, architect Edward Walters was commissioned to build 'The Firs' for Whitworth.
Joseph Whitworth | Career
The Société Anonyme des Ateliers Edouard Mennig was a Belgic manufacturer of machine tools, especially for woodworking.
Edouard Mennig | Introduction
The original tool remained in the possession of his son, Julius Muhlberg, but unfortunately it seems to be hopelessly lost to time.
Spline roller | Appearance and history
A number of prominent early-modern civil engineers originally trained as millwrights, including:
Millwright | Prominent historical millwrights
He was also a woodcutter, a hard rock miner, and a laborer building mule trains used in the Grand Canyon. Returning to Elyria in 1936, Bettcher was employed as an apprentice tool and die maker. He also started taking night courses at Fenn College (now Cleveland State University). During 12 years of night school, he studied machine tool design, metallurgy and business. In a 1988 newspaper interview, Bettcher stated, “Even as a child, everyone called me an inventor.”
Louis Bettcher | Early years
Richard Roberts (22 April 1789 – 11 March 1864) was a Welsh patternmaker and engineer whose development of high-precision machine tools contributed to the birth of production engineering and mass production.
Richard Roberts (engineer) | Introduction
He displayed his work in a cabinet that he opened to the public once a week and which became famous enough to attract politicians, scholars, artisans and other inventors. It featured model water pumps and Archimedes' screws, siege engines, designs of floating bridges and clocks regulated by balls travelling down inclined planes or along spiral tracks, machines to trace landscape and to convert plan images into perspective, odometers with reducing gears, wheelchairs, many intricate pieces of lathe-work in ivory and wood, and an improved version of Agostino Ramelli's reading wheel that allowed many books to be read by means of a rotating wheel.
Nicolas Grollier de Servière | Introduction
Hartness encouraged talented inventors in his employ at J&L to strike out on their own as entrepreneurs. These included three Springfield companies and one Windsor, Vermont company: The companies started by these men helped make Springfield and Windsor a prosperous manufacturing region, thanks not to its access to raw materials or markets, but due to a pool of talented engineers and machinists. Joseph Roe ranked Hartness in the class of Henry Maudslay and Elisha K. Root for his mentorship of a younger generation of machine tool builders.
James Hartness | Mentor of machine tool entrepreneurs
But if pressed, I would vote for the toolmakers because they give us the eyes to see things.
Norman H. Nie | Early years
The economic historians Roger Lloyd-Jones and Myrrdin Lewis have analysed the company's minute books to derive the following information on profits during the inter-war period: A further example of how innovatory the company could be is apparent in 1936, when it introduced the first electronics for control of precision grinding machines, this being a timing device.
The Churchill Machine Tool Company | Subsequent history: The Churchill Machine Tool Co
Many of them provide the background for shorter articles in Diderot's "Encyclopedia", which was appearing at much the same time. The project had its origin in request from Colbert in 1675 to the Academy Royal des Sciences for detailed accounts of various mechanic arts to be prepared and for new machines to be reported upon. This led to the formation of the Bignon Commission under Abbé Bignon. René-Antoine Ferchault de Réaumur (1683–1757) became editor soon after he joined the Academy. He inherited number of drawings (the earliest prepared in 1693) and an illustrated manuscript on printing, type and book binding, which had been prepared in 1704.
Descriptions des Arts et Métiers | Introduction
The machine failed, however. During World War I the brothers worked in the family home at a pedal-powered lathe, producing pieces for a Brussels workshop; they also built engines. They ventured into building a five-meter-long blimp that they fill with compressed air.
Alfred Renard | Biography
The archaeological record also shows that the early Egyptian dynasties made tools and household equipment that illustrated ergonomic principles.
Human factors and ergonomics | In ancient societies
Most of the tools were collected by Raphael Salaman (1906–1993), who wrote two classic works on the subject: "Dictionary of Woodworking Tools" and "Dictionary of Leather-working Tools". David Russell's vast collection of Western hand tools from the Stone Age to the twentieth century led to the publication of his book "Antique Woodworking Tools".
Hand tool | History
Each bit was forged with a hammer, quenched, and then ground with a grindstone. The exact details of the heat treatment and tip geometry were a matter of individual experience and preference. A substantial technological advance occurred in the 1890–1910 period, when Frederick Winslow Taylor applied scientific methods to the study of tool bits and their cutting performance (including their geometry, metallurgy, and heat treatment, and the resulting speeds and feeds, depths of cut, metal-removal rates, and tool life). Along with Maunsel White and various assistants, he developed high speed steels (whose properties come from both their alloying element mixtures and their heat treatment methods).
Tool bit | History
Much importance has been given to the country’s industrialisation even before freedom was won (1947), but credit must be given to Naval for taking the initiative in manufacturing machine tools nearly a decade earlier. The opportunity came during the war years when the machines required by Godrej could no longer be imported. Naval rose to the challenge and in the 1940s, he created a path-breaking line of machines including the first 35 tonne power press. He also pioneered the indigenous manufacture of machine tools & metal forming and machine cutting machines.
Naval Godrej | The Tool Room and Machine Tools
The use of machine tools began with the onset of the First Industrial Revolution. The increase in mechanization required more metal parts, which were usually made of cast iron or wrought iron—and hand working lacked precision and was a slow and expensive process. One of the first machine tools was John Wilkinson's boring machine, that bored a precise hole in James Watt's first steam engine in 1774. Advances in the accuracy of machine tools can be traced to Henry Maudslay and refined by Joseph Whitworth. Standardization of screw threads began with Henry Maudslay around 1800, when the modern screw-cutting lathe made interchangeable V-thread machine screws a practical commodity.
Second Industrial Revolution | Machine tools
Battison's article "Eli Whitney and the Milling Machine," which was published in the "Smithsonian Journal of History" in 1966, exemplifies the dispelling of the "Great Man" image of Whitney by historians of technology working in the 1950s and 1960s. He quotes Battison as concluding that "There is no evidence that Whitney developed or used a true milling machine." Baida says, "The so-called Whitney machine of 1818 seems actually to have been made after Whitney's death in 1825." Baida cites Battison's suggestion that the first true milling machine was made not by Whitney, but by Robert Johnson of Middletown. The late teens of the 19th century were a pivotal time in the history of machine tools, as the period of 1814 to 1818 is also the period during which several contemporary pioneers (Fox, Murray, and Roberts) were developing the planer, and as with the milling machine, the work being done in various shops was undocumented for various reasons (partially because of proprietary secrecy, and also simply because no one was taking down records for posterity).
Milling (machining) | 1810s–1830s
Jacques de Vaucanson (February 24, 1709 – November 21, 1782) was a French inventor and artist who was responsible for the creation of impressive and innovative automata. He also was the first person to design an automatic loom and built the first all-metal lathe.
Jacques de Vaucanson | Introduction
During the middle 1820s demand for jewelry and silverware suddenly experienced a dramatic decline, forcing Baldwin to search for a new occupation. In 1825, Baldwin went into partnership with a machinist named David Mason to form a company which made industrial equipment for printers and bookbinders: tools, dies, and machines that had previously been exclusively imported from Europe. The pair became involved in the manufacture of printing cylinders and perfected an improved process for the etching of steel plates. The needs of the growing firm demanded both larger quarters and an improved power source. In 1828 Baldwin devised and constructed his first steam engine, a stationary device that produced 5 horsepower of output and remained in use in the shop for four decades.
Matthias W. Baldwin | Machinery maker
Joseph Bamford was born into a recusant Catholic family in Uttoxeter, Staffordshire, which owned Bamfords Ltd, an agricultural engineering business. His great grandfather Henry Bamford was born in Yoxall, and had built up his own ironmongers business, which by 1881 employed 50 men, 10 boys and 3 women. Bamfords International Farm Machinery became one of the country's major agricultural equipment suppliers, famous for its balers, rakes, hay turners, hay Wufflers, Mangold cutters, and standing engines, which were exported all over the world. The company eventually ceased trading in 1986. After attending Stonyhurst College, he joined the Alfred Herbert company in Coventry, then the UK's largest machine-tool manufacturer, and rose to represent the firm in Ghana.
Joseph Bamford | Biography
The artist Richard Hamilton was a designer at Churchill Gear Machines Ltd between 1956 and 1962. Some of his work is included in the collection of the Tate Gallery.
The Churchill Machine Tool Company | Notable staff
According to art historian Peter Rockwell, several metal tools have been used, probably made of bronze. In particular these tools can be noted:
Giants of Mont'e Prama | Possible manufacturing techniques
The lathe is an ancient tool. The earliest evidence of a lathe dates back to Ancient Egypt around 1300 BC. There is also tenuous evidence for its existence at a Mycenaean Greek site, dating back as far as the 13th or 14th century BC. Clear evidence of turned artifacts have been found from the 6th century BC: fragments of a wooden bowl in an Etruscan tomb in Northern Italy as well as two flat wooden dishes with decorative turned rims from modern Turkey. During the Warring States period in China, c. 400 BCE, the ancient Chinese used rotary lathes to sharpen tools and weapons on an industrial scale.
Lathe | History
Textile machinery manufacturer and scientific writer Zachariah Allen had the following to say about Wilkinson's lathe in 1861: “It has to this day proved the most effective tool placed within the control of mankind for shaping refractory metals and for accomplishing the triumph of mind over matter. The slide engine is employed in the great machine shops of America and Europe.” Ross Tompson (2009) on the importance of Wilkinson's lathe: "worth all the other tools in use, in any workshop in the world, for finishing [machining] brass and iron"
David Wilkinson (machinist) | Wilkinson lathe
The direct ancestor of today's stenotype was created by Ward Stone Ireland in about 1913, and the word "stenotype" was applied to his machine and its descendants sometime thereafter.
Stenotype | History
Richard Lovell Edgeworth tried in 1770 to construct a machine he called a "Wooden Horse", but was not successful.
Leg mechanism | History
Edouard Mennig founded his company in Avenue Van Volxem 310-312 in Brussels. His wood working machines were driven by a series of pulleys and belts and used for many operations from chopping to crafting.
Edouard Mennig | History
Isambard Kingdom grew up in Lindsey House in Chelsea, London. During the summer of 1799 Brunel was introduced to Henry Maudslay, a talented engineer who had worked for Joseph Bramah, and had recently started his own business. Maudslay made working models of the machines for making pulley blocks, and Brunel approached Samuel Bentham, the Inspector General of Naval Works. In April 1802 Bentham recommended the installation of Brunel's block-making machinery at Portsmouth Block Mills. Brunel's machine could be operated by unskilled workers, at ten times the previous rate of production. Altogether 45 machines were installed at Portsmouth, and by 1808 the plant was producing 130,000 blocks per year.
Marc Isambard Brunel | Britain
In 1866, Swasey and Warner met as fellow apprentices at the Exeter Machine Works in Exeter, New Hampshire. Within a few years they went together to Pratt & Whitney in Hartford, Connecticut, which was one of the leading machine tool builders of the era. There they both rose through the ranks, with Warner rising to be in charge of an assembly floor and Swasey rising to be foreman of the gear-cutting department. There Swasey invented the epicycloidal milling machine for cutting true theoretical curves for the milling cutters used for cutting gears. In 1880, Swasey and Warner resigned from Pratt & Whitney in order to start a machine-tool-building business together.
Warner &amp; Swasey Company | History
The process used externally heated retorts identical in concept to those used by Dr. Pidgeon two years later.
Pidgeon process | Historical background