Rodley Crane Works

jane666 · Post by **jane666** » Mon 05 May, 2008 8:14 pm

my dad worked for thomas smiths, which was part of the crane works at rodley, from when he was 15 til he was made redundant in about 1997, over 30 years service.he started as teaboy/office junior, just before he left he was an export sales manager, and went all around the globe selling cranes. the company can't have been short of money, he always flew first class and they even bought an apartment in cairo for him. they had their own magazine for employees, which i'm sure he's still got in the bottom of his wardrobe and in the 60s had their own cricket team which he was in. i remember walking past where he worked when i was little, it seemed to stretch for miles.

Trojan · Post by **Trojan** » Mon 05 May, 2008 8:21 pm

jane666 wrote: my dad worked for thomas smiths, which was part of the crane works at rodley, from when he was 15 til he was made redundant in about 1997, over 30 years service.he started as teaboy/office junior, just before he left he was an export sales manager, and went all around the globe selling cranes. the company can't have been short of money, he always flew first class and they even bought an apartment in cairo for him. they had their own magazine for employees, which i'm sure he's still got in the bottom of his wardrobe and in the 60s had their own cricket team which he was in. i remember walking past where he worked when i was little, it seemed to stretch for miles. They were taken over by Thomas W Ward - who also bought Fowlers - at a guess they were asset stripped.I knew a bloke who was apprenticed at Smiths, when I knew him he worked for Priestman (another crane manufacturer from Hull) they had a depot opposite the Pheasant at Birstall and they reconned used equipment there - this guy was in charge of this department.He told me the tale that he took his kids to the Railway Museum at York and in those days they had a pit and you could walk under a locomotive and see how it worked underneath, of course having served his time at Smiths when they were still building steam cranes he knew exactly what everything was and how it worked, and he was explaining it all to his kids, he looked down from the workings above to see he was surrounded by American tourists who thought he was a guide

jane666 · Post by **jane666** » Mon 05 May, 2008 8:33 pm

i remember whenever we were out, if we saw a crane and it had 'coles' written on it, we had to boo. they must've been their main competitor.

Phill_d · Post by **Phill_d** » Mon 05 May, 2008 8:35 pm

jane666 wrote: i remember whenever we were out, if we saw a crane and it had 'coles' written on it, we had to boo. they must've been their main competitor. Hello Jane. good to see your still with us

Trojan · Post by **Trojan** » Mon 05 May, 2008 9:26 pm

jane666 wrote: i remember whenever we were out, if we saw a crane and it had 'coles' written on it, we had to boo. they must've been their main competitor. Coles were mainly lorry mounted cranes - I hadn't realised that Smiths built those. I was mainly involved with crawler cranes, Smiths competitors in this market in the Uk were the previously mentioned Priestman (from Hull) Ruston Bucyrus (from Lincoln) and NCK (from Ipswich and Chapeltown Sheffield - where the Churchill tank was also built)

raveydavey · Post by **raveydavey** » Tue 06 May, 2008 9:04 pm

Trojan wrote: Ruston Bucyrus (from Lincoln) Are they anything to do with that giant crawler / digger at the old opencast site at Allerton Bywater? Isn't that a Bucyrus something?

Trojan · Post by **Trojan** » Tue 06 May, 2008 10:19 pm

raveydavey wrote: Trojan wrote: Ruston Bucyrus (from Lincoln) Are they anything to do with that giant crawler / digger at the old opencast site at Allerton Bywater? Isn't that a Bucyrus something? Could be a Bucyrus Erie - Ruston built the BE machines in the UK under licence and called them RB the "R" was the Ruston-Hornsby engine. I must admit I thought the dragline at St Aidens was a NCK, but I could certainly be wrong.

raveydavey · Post by **raveydavey** » Wed 07 May, 2008 9:24 pm

It is a Bucyrus Erie - Phil has some fantastic images of it here:http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fusea ... 5577351The name rang a bell, but I didn't have time to look into it further last night. Apparently the one at St Aidans was built in the USA though. Co-incidence or what?

Trojan · Post by **Trojan** » Wed 07 May, 2008 10:13 pm

raveydavey wrote: It is a Bucyrus Erie - Phil has some fantastic images of it here:http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fusea ... 5577351The name rang a bell, but I didn't have time to look into it further last night. Apparently the one at St Aidans was built in the USA though. Co-incidence or what? Very good. The picture with the name "Rapier" on it though indicates that there must have been a NCK machine there - there were certainly two at one point in the eighties - and that it was the other one that was a NCK - Rapier being their trade name. As I said in my earlier post they were built at Ipswich and up to the eighties at Chapeltown Sheffield - just off the A61 near M1 Jct 36.

Trojan · Post by **Trojan** » Wed 07 May, 2008 10:14 pm

Sorry