Machinery and Plant

The number and variety of cutting and forming machine tools currently in use in the various machine shops of the main works for the repair and construction of locomotives, carriages and wagons or other aids to production is so great that it is difficult to visualise the dearth of facilities at the beginning of the railway age in Britain. It is appropriate to consider some developments in machinery and plant as well as the materials used since that early date, and also to indicate the importance of the railway engineer in optimising the combined influence of design, materials, tools, machinery and technology.