Salford Electrical Instruments

Salford Electrical Instruments Ltd
IndustryElectronics
Founded1910
Defunct1993
FateReabsorbed by General Electric Company
Headquarters
Salford, England
Area served
Worldwide
ProductsElectrical testing equipment, measurement instruments

Salford Electrical Instruments Ltd (SEI; colloquially: Salford Elec) was a British manufacturer of electrical measurement and testing instruments based in Salford, England. Closely tied to the General Electric Company (GEC) conglomerate, the company was well-established in the electrical equipment industry in the United Kingdom in the 20th century.

History

Miniature valve voltmeter made by SEI, advertised in The Post Office Electrical Engineers' Journal, 1937

In 1910, the meter department of GEC was incorporated separately as Salford Electrical Instruments Ltd, a subsidiary company employing 1,000 workers. Since 1905 the department had been based at Bow Street Works, a small two-storey building at the rear of GEC's large Peel Works on Silk Street.[1][2] In around 1921 it expanded to fill the whole Peel Works, after the departure of GEC's Peel-Conner Telephone Works to Coventry, and the extension of the site to accommodate a new factory.[2][3]

SEI's managing director, Henry Cobden Turner, is known for his work on the radio proximity fuse, an important innovation during the Second World War.[4][5] The device was manufactured at the Salford works, and was over 90% successful in disrupting German flying bombs such as the V-1 and V-2 in mid-air, significantly reducing civilian casualties.[4] The company was also active in the development of radar technology,[when?] with early experiments conducted from the roof at Silk Street, tracking vehicles on nearby streets.[4]

By the 1960s, Salford Electrical Instruments was primarily focused on assembling electronic measuring instruments. After a partial floor collapse in the Silk Street factory in March 1965,[6] the company relocated to Barton Lane in Eccles, taking over the four-acre site of the former Jonex Mills. Here, the company produced electrical components such as capacitors, thermostats, telecommunications equipment, rectifiers, and potentiometers.[4] SEI also opened a factory in Heywood, Greater Manchester. At its peak, SEI employed 3,000 people over 7 factories.[7]

Decline

The Eccles factory closed in the early 1980s. The site was subsequently redeveloped into an industrial estate.[4] The company suffered from financial problems in the early 1990s, leading it to sell its magnetic materials division to Neoside Limited and its mining product business to Rowe Hankins Components Ltd in 1993, while the crystals division was sold to Plessey.[3]

On December 22, 1993, the remaining assets were transferred to GEC, and the company ceased to operate independently. In Heywood, local Member of Parliament Jim Callaghan unsuccessfully appealed to Lord Weinstock, the managing director of GEC, to retain the factory, saying its closure would result in the loss of 362 jobs.[8] In 1999 GEC merged with British Aerospace to form BAE Systems, and Salford Electrical Instruments became part of this larger entity.[3]

Products

Salford Electrical Instruments had a diverse industrial product portfolio, including:

Prototype reel-to-reel tape machine produced by SEI, in the collection of the Museum of Science and Industry (Manchester)

It also manufactured consumer products, including the UK version of the Viewmaster in the 1940s.[9]

See also

References

  1. ^ a b "Salford Electrical Instruments". Grace's Guide to British Industrial History. Retrieved 2024-12-04.
  2. ^ a b Bob Estreich; Alan Gall. "GEC and the Telephone" (PDF). The Institute of Science & Technology (Spring 2008): 10–14. ISSN 0141-9099. Retrieved 5 December 2024.
  3. ^ a b c "Salford Electrical Instruments Ltd". Science Museum Group Collection. Retrieved 2024-12-04.
  4. ^ a b c d e f Tony Flynn (2020-04-08). "50 years ago in Salford: War-winning electrical wonder firm packs up for Eccles". SalfordOnline. Retrieved 2024-12-04.
  5. ^ "Henry Cobden-Turner | Science Museum Group Collection". collection.sciencemuseumgroup.org.uk. Science Museum Group. Retrieved 5 December 2024.
  6. ^ "5-storey Salford factory sinks - shock for workers". Huddersfield Daily Examiner. 9 March 1965. p. 8. Retrieved 7 December 2024. WORKERS at a Salford factory had a lucky escape today when part of each of five floors caved in. A 30ft hole appeared in the floors as a cast-iron stanchion supporting the ground floor slowly sank. Vertical supports above it sank as well, causing the damage to the upper floors but the greater part of each floor remained intact. A roll call by police outside the firm Salford Electrical Instruments Ltd showed that none of the 500 workers was missing. About 200 work in the affected building but they were not all there at the time.
  7. ^ "Welcome SDA Electronics Ltd". Business Archives Council Newsletter. 147 (Autumn 2007). Business Archives Council: 2. ISSN 0309-4200.
  8. ^ "Last hope quashed for S.E.I." The Heywood Advertiser and General Family Newspaper. Heywood, Greater Manchester, England. 20 May 1993. p. 11. Retrieved 5 December 2024.
  9. ^ "View-Master Model B - The first bakelite ViewMaster". www.viewmaster.co.uk. Retrieved 5 December 2024.