It’s easy to see industrial sites through rose tinted glasses when walking round old, derelict sites or museums, but I’ve spent my career in factories and I know that even today, industry can be hot, hard, sometimes dangerous work. This old foundry is a great example of that – podging rods such as this were used to tap the hot…
Tag: Sigma 14mm
#120 – Cupola Flowers!
Like all abandoned sites, nature has taken up where it left off before the site was developed.
#117 – Lethal Processes
I don’t know what this building used to do at Royal Ordnance Factory (ROF) Wrexham, but I suspect it was something dangerous that involved making or processing something lethal. Either way, it’s remained unused for over 60 years, the only evidence left being the foundations for something, and a large sunken pool of water at one end…
#116 – Grown Up Scalextric – Chassis
One I missed from the series of images that I posted from the Leyland Test Track. I’ve since been told that this is probably a wrecked computer monitor, but I saw it and noticed the word ‘chassis’ on it’s base and thought it appropriate. It’s perhaps not as prominent in the composition as I’d have…
#115 – Pattern
Pattern found in the foundry. Note sure why, but casting patterns are often painted red (although you can’t see that in this photo). There were quite a few patterns left around the place, quite surprised they’d not gone on a bonfire when the place shut.
#113 – 13
Huge bowl mounted on a railway wagon for transporting iron round the works. Sometimes photos work just as well in colour as they do in black and white, this is an example of that, as the rich brown texture of the image is such a dominant part of the composition. By converting to black and white,…
#112 – Terex
This giant dumptruck had its engine removed before being dragged by a bulldozer up the hill to its current resting place. I can only imagine the strength of the guy who apparently sat in the cab and steered it while it was under tow as without an engine there’s be no power steering!
#111 Bunker
Entrance to some kind of bunker at ROF Wrexham. This was once a huge site, but it was closed after WW2 and most of it has been cleared for the Wrexham Industrial Estate. A few buildings remain, but are often innaccesible due to the thick undergrowth that, especially in summer, prevent you getting anywhere near.
#109 – Grown Up Scalextric – Tyres
I don’t know why, but I was surprised to see piles of tyres at the test track. Turns out most of them were to indicate where manholes were, becuase the manhole covers had all been nicked. However, it did seem appropriate somehow.
#108 – Grown Up Scalextric – Armco
I used to have a Scalextric when I was younger, complete with banked corners, cross-overs and all sorts. At around that time, this place was in full swing, testing trucks from the production lines at the nearby Leyland Motors Works. Since then, the place has gone into an irreversible decline, and like pretty much all of…
Mechanical Landscapes 