IMAGES TAKEN NEAR TO
George Street, HUDDERSFIELD, HD3 4JD

This Ashworth and Parker duplex was added in 1988, secondhand from a dyers in Bulwell, Notts. It was apparently greedy and saw little use. It was in a separate engine house to the two Belliss engines.

Sadly this has now all been swept away. The mills were still in use for textiles and the original engine house had been reused to house these two Belliss & Morcom engines that were part of a combined heat and power scheme. This was a tidy and well-engineered scheme and it is sadly missed.

A small textile town on the River Colne upstream from Huddersfield. The photographer position is approximate on Whiteley Street and tree growth would probably prevent a repeat. The big mill in the centre is George Street Mills and has been demolished. Three masonry chimneys can be seen and I think they have all gone by now.

Photographed across the derelict Huddersfield Narrow Canal from near the bottom of Whiteley Street. I've got a load of Colne Valley pictures taken on this and other days but am concerned that I might not be able to place them all.

The tower on the right and the chimney belong to James Shires, George Street Mills. Now demolished. The satellite image still shows many weaving sheds in this area, some over the River Colne. There are still many corners to photograph in this area.

This Ashworth and Parker duplex was added in 1988, secondhand from a dyers in Bulwell, Notts. It was apparently greedy and saw little use. It was in a separate engine house to the two Belliss engines. The whole site has now been demolished and new units erected where once a multi-storey mill stood.

This was a working textile mill in Milnsbridge with three stationary steam engines driving alternators as part of a combined heat and power system. This was lying in the yard and had recently been acquired by the chief engineer for himself. It is a Ruston single cylinder diesel used as a college test engine. The far flywheel is actually a brake wheel for measuring brake horsepower. This works was a fascinating example of how to operate a sensible steam plant but has now all been swept away.

James Shires were still in textiles in 1990 and used three steam engines as part of a combined heat and power scheme. Steam was raised in a pair of Robey three pass packaged boilers with automation of water level and firing. I think they were dual fuel oil or gas. These are pretty typical of the more modern packaged shell boilers and similar are still to be found raising steam in many locations. I have surprisingly few photographs of this type of plant (familiarity breeds contempt etc). The boilers and engines were in the older multi-storey mill but production was across the road in a single storey metal clad complex.

This engine house once held a horizontal tandem compound mill engine but when I took this it was home to two working Belliss and Morcom steam engines installed in 1980 and 1983. They ran into the early 1990s and were scrapped in 1997. They were part of a highly sensible combined heat and power scheme and this concept is certainly not dead. On this visit I learnt about four engines in a powerhouse at Deanshanger Oxides. The closest engine was undergoing maintenance and was No. 3373 of 1907 and installed third-hand in 1983. This was a C-type inverted vertical compound good for 120 brake horsepower at 500 rpm. The little blue box was a modern electronic governor that replaced the original crankshaft mounted centrifugal governor.