Sidney Marmaduke Stuart Turner (1869 – April 1938) was an English
engineer
Engineers, as practitioners of engineering, are professionals who Invention, invent, design, build, maintain and test machines, complex systems, structures, gadgets and materials. They aim to fulfill functional objectives and requirements while ...
. He was the founder of the company
Stuart Turner Ltd.
Biography
Turner was born in
Shepherd's Bush
Shepherd's Bush is a suburb of West London, England, within the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham west of Charing Cross, and identified as a major metropolitan centre in the London Plan.
Although primarily residential in character, its ...
, London in 1869. Little is known about his childhood or adolescence although it is known that his family's ambitions for him did not include becoming an engineer.
Career
After a series of other jobs including an apprenticeship on the Clyde building marine engines, a period at sea and working as an engineer in
Jersey
Jersey ( ; ), officially the Bailiwick of Jersey, is an autonomous and self-governing island territory of the British Islands. Although as a British Crown Dependency it is not a sovereign state, it has its own distinguishing civil and gov ...
(where he installed electricity generating plant), Turner gained employment in 1897 looking after the steam generating plant at
Shiplake Court near
Henley-on-Thames
Henley-on-Thames ( ) is a town status in the United Kingdom, town and Civil parishes in England, civil parish on the River Thames, in the South Oxfordshire district, in Oxfordshire, England, northeast of Reading, Berkshire, Reading, west of M ...
, England.
[H. Sanderson, "Short History of Stuart Turner", November 1938, Archived from Stuart Marine Engines website][Stuart Turner website "About Us"](_blank)
/ref> In those days mains electricity was rare and therefore most large houses had their own electricity generating plants.
It was while working at Shiplake
Shiplake consists of three settlements: Shiplake, Shiplake Cross and Lower Shiplake. Together these villages form a Civil parishes in England, civil parish situated beside the River Thames south of Henley-on-Thames, Oxfordshire, England. The r ...
that Turner designed his No.1 Model Steam Engine. He drew up the patterns which he then sent away to be cast. On their return he machined and assembled them and soon showed the finished model at a local exhibition. He then approached Percival Marshall the editor of Model Engineer magazine who wrote an article about the engine. This coverage brought an immediate response and orders for sets of castings flooded in, and a business was established in 1898. He was joined in the business by Alexander Frederick (Alec) Plint in 1903, who he had worked with in Jersey and was trained in electrical engineering.two-stroke engine
A two-stroke (or two-stroke cycle) engine is a type of internal combustion engine that completes a Thermodynamic power cycle, power cycle with two strokes of the piston, one up and one down, in one revolution of the crankshaft in contrast to a f ...
s used in boats, generators, as well as model engines and castings aimed at the model engineering market. They also briefly made a motorcycle
A motorcycle (motorbike, bike; uni (if one-wheeled); trike (if three-wheeled); quad (if four-wheeled)) is a lightweight private 1-to-2 passenger personal motor vehicle Steering, steered by a Motorcycle handlebar, handlebar from a saddle-style ...
and the Stuart lathe, and latterly a range of centrifugal pump
Centrifugal pumps are used to transport fluids by the Energy transformation, conversion of rotational kinetic energy to the hydrodynamic energy of the fluid flow. The rotational energy typically comes from an engine or electric motor. They are ...
s. The name Stuart Turner is eponymous with small quality models, and many of the steam models and rarer internal combustion models are much sought after by collectors.
The Stuart Turner Ltd company was established in 1906 in Henley-on-Thames.
Death
Stuart Turner left the firm in 1920 and went to South Africa. He returned to Southend
Southend-on-Sea (), commonly referred to as Southend (), is a coastal city and unitary authorities of England, unitary authority area with Borough status in the United Kingdom, borough status in south-eastern Essex, England. It lies on the nor ...
to retire and died in April 1938.
See also
* Stuart Turner (company)
* Whitney (City Road, London) who made lighting plant, generators, small steam models and centrifugal pumps
References
External links
Stuart Models website
Stuart engine design and analysis website for fans
{{DEFAULTSORT:Turner, Stuart
1869 births
1938 deaths
People from Henley-on-Thames
English engineers
Model engineers