Visited this on a trip up to Scotland for Christmas after a tip off from mookster. A nice relaxed wander this place was. It's fairly stripped, but the main warehouses were quite photogenic and found some offices as well with stores. Since mookster had been they had freshly boarded the labs and main office block. But managed to find a sneaky way in easily enough. Shame it was such a damp day with the fog coming in very heavily as I was leaving. Plans had been drawn up to build a restaurant and hotel. A filling station and offices and drive through coffee shop. I do believe it was demolished the following year so do wonder if that plan went ahead.
Basically the factory was a big producer of alloy products for the aerospace industry mainly. But also produced for the defence and nuclear industry as well. The company started life in Slough in 1927 as High Duty Alloys founded by Colonel Wallace Charles. The company was doing a lot of work for rolls Royce during the 30s and expansion was needed. So another factory was built at Redditch in 1939. With the outbreak of war another factory was needed and to be a shadow factory. So the site at Lillyhall was selected and work started in 1940 by John Laing Ltd. When the site opened in December 1940, work was full on. With a workforce of 3000 production was 24/7. The foundry , forge and presses produced parts for nearly all the parts for British aircraft and engines.
After the war the company struggled to adjust and the workforce was reduced to around 1000. HDA restructured the whole company Slough was allocated for castings, Redditch for forging and Lillyhall for extrusions. A new 5,000 ton press were added to the site in 1952 to add to the two other presses there and the water press.
The 60s saw a turn around for the company and they were producing all sorts of items from stadium seating and ladders to car parts and lighting. And by 1969 they were producing parts for the Concorde, over a hundred in total. Also parts for helicopters, warships and armoured vehicles and even the harrier.
The company went through a recession in aluminium and was restructured again. It was then bought out several times before finally becoming Alcan High Extrusions Ltd in 1985. The site was modernised and the plant to meet new demands. The company went through more restructuring and buyouts during the 80s and 90s. The last owner was a French company called Pechiney who was Europe's largest producer of aluminium, they bought the site in 2001 and took on a workforce of 280. They made more redundancies in early 2006 and then in July they announced they were moving all production to France, and by July 2007 the last remaining 160 workers were made redundant the site shut it's doors for good.
Starting up with top area of large units. This was I can imagine the production and finishing areas.
Moving down to middle areas and we have some offices and stores.
Then moving down to the bottom of the site which would be the area were the aluminium processing would go on with the furnaces down here.
Continued..
Basically the factory was a big producer of alloy products for the aerospace industry mainly. But also produced for the defence and nuclear industry as well. The company started life in Slough in 1927 as High Duty Alloys founded by Colonel Wallace Charles. The company was doing a lot of work for rolls Royce during the 30s and expansion was needed. So another factory was built at Redditch in 1939. With the outbreak of war another factory was needed and to be a shadow factory. So the site at Lillyhall was selected and work started in 1940 by John Laing Ltd. When the site opened in December 1940, work was full on. With a workforce of 3000 production was 24/7. The foundry , forge and presses produced parts for nearly all the parts for British aircraft and engines.
After the war the company struggled to adjust and the workforce was reduced to around 1000. HDA restructured the whole company Slough was allocated for castings, Redditch for forging and Lillyhall for extrusions. A new 5,000 ton press were added to the site in 1952 to add to the two other presses there and the water press.
The 60s saw a turn around for the company and they were producing all sorts of items from stadium seating and ladders to car parts and lighting. And by 1969 they were producing parts for the Concorde, over a hundred in total. Also parts for helicopters, warships and armoured vehicles and even the harrier.
The company went through a recession in aluminium and was restructured again. It was then bought out several times before finally becoming Alcan High Extrusions Ltd in 1985. The site was modernised and the plant to meet new demands. The company went through more restructuring and buyouts during the 80s and 90s. The last owner was a French company called Pechiney who was Europe's largest producer of aluminium, they bought the site in 2001 and took on a workforce of 280. They made more redundancies in early 2006 and then in July they announced they were moving all production to France, and by July 2007 the last remaining 160 workers were made redundant the site shut it's doors for good.
Starting up with top area of large units. This was I can imagine the production and finishing areas.
Moving down to middle areas and we have some offices and stores.
Then moving down to the bottom of the site which would be the area were the aluminium processing would go on with the furnaces down here.
Continued..
