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CHAIN TEST HOUSE

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Metal testing house to the Great Western Railway Swindon Works. It was constructed in 1874 as a narrow range bisecting the remaining area of an open courtyard in the northern quadrangle. It comprises a narrow single storey building with a central channel housing the test bed for the Ransome Chain Testing Machine. The building is of brick with a wrought iron roof.

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SU 14308505: Chain Test House, Rodbourne Road, BREL: Swindon Works, Grade II*. Metal Testing House. 1873. Long single storey brick structure built on to an older building and thus having only one external wall. The testing room has largely original fittings and a very Victorian atmosphere. The Ransome's chain tester of 1874 has a hydraulic pull of 130 tons and is probably the oldest such working machine in the country. There are also a later tensile tester and an Izod's Patent tester by Avery's. A fine collection of Victorian testing machinery in original setting and in working order, the whole now extremely rare. Part of the great expansion of the works in the 1870's and one of an important group of industrial buildings at the GWR works.

(For full description see list.) (1)

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( 1) List of Buildings of Special Architectural or Historic Interest

Borough of Thamesdown: Swindon, April 1986 1097 Page(s)84

( 2) John Cattell and Keith Falconer 1995 Swindon : the legacy of a railway town

Page(s)94, 147

( 3) Alan S Peck 1983 The Great Western at Swindon works

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GREAT WESTERN RAILWAY SWINDON WORKS
SWINDON

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Railway works designed by Brunel to provide stabling, maintenance and repair facilities for locomotives. The works were built in 1841 and officially o...

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