Davies and Metcalfe Ltd is a railway equipment and locomotive manufacturer from

Romiley Romiley is a village in the Metropolitan Borough of Stockport, Greater Manchester, England. Historic counties of England, Historically part of Cheshire, it borders Marple, Greater Manchester, Marple, Bredbury and Woodley, Greater Manchester, Wood ...

, Manchester, England. It was founded in

Aberystwyth Aberystwyth (; ) is a University town, university and seaside town and a community (Wales), community in Ceredigion, Wales. It is the largest town in Ceredigion and from Aberaeron, the county's other administrative centre. In 2021, the popula ...

in 1878. The company is now owned and run by Richard Charles Metcalfe and they continue to manufacture steam locomotive and traction engine parts from original drawings, as well as modern railway parts worldwide.

History

Rheidol Foundry

James Metcalfe (1847–1920) was apprenticed to Sharp Stewart and worked for the company until 1867 before joining the Manchester and Milford Railway at

as locomotive foreman. Between 1875 and 1877 he took out three patents for an improved exhaust steam injector for steam locomotives and developed it with the financial support of David Davies "Llandinam" and Edward Hamer, the General Manager of the Manchester & Milford Railway. The Patent Exhaust Steam Injector Company was established at the Rheidol Foundry, Aberystwyth in April 1878.

Davies and Metcalfe

The company later moved to

in the

Metropolitan Borough of Stockport The Metropolitan Borough of Stockport is a metropolitan borough of Greater Manchester in England. It is south-east of central Manchester and south of Tameside. As well as the towns of Stockport, Bredbury and Marple, Greater Manchester, Marple, ...

Greater Manchester Greater Manchester is a ceremonial county in North West England. It borders Lancashire to the north, Derbyshire and West Yorkshire to the east, Cheshire to the south, and Merseyside to the west. Its largest settlement is the city of Manchester. ...

and changed its name to Davies and Metcalfe. It produced a range of locomotive engineering products including lubricators, exhaust steam injectors, vacuum brake ejectors etc. They later manufactured entire braking systems for locomotives and trains becoming one of the largest suppliers in the industry along with Westinghouse. Their products included brake tread units, drivers brake valves, distributors, air reservoirs, the 2A115 Series Air Compressor, electropneumatic valves, brake cylinders, and brake control units.

Locomotives

The company built two

locomotives A locomotive is a rail vehicle that provides the motive power for a train. Traditionally, locomotives pulled trains from the front. However, push–pull operation has become common, and in the pursuit for longer and heavier freight train ...

for the gauge

Vale of Rheidol Railway The Vale of Rheidol Railway () is a Narrow gauge railway, narrow gauge heritage railway in Ceredigion, Wales, between Aberystwyth and Devil's Bridge, Ceredigion, Devil's Bridge; a journey of . It opened in 1902 and, from the Withdrawal of ste ...

at Aberystwyth in 1902. They also renovated two locomotives for the North Wales Narrow Gauge Railway in 1902 (Snowdon Ranger) and 1903 Moel Tryfan).

Metcalfe-Oerlikon

Davies and Metcalfe had an arrangement with Oerlikon and sold

railway air brake A railway air brake is a railway brake power braking system with compressed air as the operating medium. Modern trains rely upon a fail-safe air brake system that is based upon a design patented by George Westinghouse on April 13, 1869. Th ...

equipment under the name Metcalfe-Oerlikon. This was fitted to some

British Railways British Railways (BR), which from 1965 traded as British Rail, was a state-owned company that operated most rail transport in Great Britain from 1948 to 1997. Originally a trading brand of the Railway Executive of the British Transport Commis ...

diesel locomotive A diesel locomotive is a type of railway locomotive in which the prime mover (locomotive), power source is a diesel engine. Several types of diesel locomotives have been developed, differing mainly in the means by which mechanical power is con ...

s, e.g., Classes 45 and 46.

Notes

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References

*Richard Metcalfe. ''Davies & Metcalfe Ltd: railway engineers to the world''. 1999. 208 pp. 142 illus. Locomotive manufacturers of the United Kingdom Companies established in 1878