BRUSH electrical history - a collection.
What's NEW
Here are the most recent additions to the collection. If you are a return visitor, this will be where the items rediscovered or newly identified can be found. In a month or so, these will be moved into the main record by region and date. There are more items gathered and provided by interested people to be scanned and included, so check back often. Links are provided (TOP Menu) for a quick connection to the relevant time period.
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1: At the beginning of connected electric power systems in the UK - the Brush built Ljungstrom VAX steam turbines were built in Loughborough and supplied to cities across the UK. Here is the bottom half of the turbine after casting and machining being shipped out to Brighton on the south coast of England. Rated at 30MW the two turbine generator sets were the largest built at the time. Over the next 20 years, city power systems were connected across the country to form the electric power (CEGB) grid.
2: From the "Turbines from Finspang" history book published in 2013, a very interesting image is presented. In 1913 Brush were licensed by Svenska Turbinfabriks AB Ljungstrom (STAL) company to build the Ljungstorm designed steam turbines in Loughborough for central power station production. Here is a photo of the original Ljungstrom order book which shows the first three orders for turbines were all for Brush projects - two for Willesden Power Station in London. These equipments lead the way for Brush to supply many cities across the UK with their first electric power systems. Soon, every major town had its own power station this before the electric grid was connected across the UK. Loughborough got its own power stationin 1914 and one of the Brush built original Ljungstrom turbines is preserved at Leicester Museum of Technology at Abbey Road Pumping Station.
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STAL joined with ASEA, then Asea Brown Boveri and eventually became part of the worldwide Siemens Electric Power group.
3: There's a lot of wind energy out there - if only we can capture it ! One of the first electrical generating windmills was running in 1880, designed and built by Charles Brush, set up in the back yard of his Cleveland home. This video shows the same illustrations you can find on the front cover from the 1890 Scientific American magazine. You can also check out the Brush Windmill page here.
