Good question- often wondered myself.
"HW" seems to suggest "Henry Williams" but as far as I know there is no such connection despite the fact that one of the things I associate them with is pointwork; the HW name remains a mystery to me.
Pretty certain the machine is broadly contemporaneous with the competitor- the WB&SC style "63". This plus the fact that there were HW1000 (dc electrified railway) and HW2000 (ac electrified railway) variants would place it no later than the very early 1960s (at the time that the West Coast Main Line electrification was underway). Similarly it is most unlikely to have been earlier than after 1955 (railway modernisation plan) which then led to many MAS schemes replacing many of the mechanical signalboxes that previously had controlled almost all of the primary as well as secondary routes.
My railway company history is not good enough to know when and in what order: AEI / SGE / Met Vickers / General Signal amalgamated and somehow became part of the GEC empire to form GEC-General Signal {however something I have found on the internet suggests this company existed between 1954 - 2006]. I rather guessed that this was all happening about this time and that the HW was developed by whatever that company was actually called in those days- pretty sure that it is a development of the earlier SGE machines, but whether this was underway before the conglomeration or only once the merger had happened I have no idea; someone in the Signal Record Society is bound to know (even though the main interest tends to be in signalboxes and the railway operator rather than S&T engineering).
As and when I am with someone that might know (I believe that at the time it was first manufactured I was probably still in my pram- no comments ) I'll try to remember to ask. What I can tell you for free is that they are now actually manufactured largely in Poland but that wouldn't have been an option back then!
"HW" seems to suggest "Henry Williams" but as far as I know there is no such connection despite the fact that one of the things I associate them with is pointwork; the HW name remains a mystery to me.
Pretty certain the machine is broadly contemporaneous with the competitor- the WB&SC style "63". This plus the fact that there were HW1000 (dc electrified railway) and HW2000 (ac electrified railway) variants would place it no later than the very early 1960s (at the time that the West Coast Main Line electrification was underway). Similarly it is most unlikely to have been earlier than after 1955 (railway modernisation plan) which then led to many MAS schemes replacing many of the mechanical signalboxes that previously had controlled almost all of the primary as well as secondary routes.
My railway company history is not good enough to know when and in what order: AEI / SGE / Met Vickers / General Signal amalgamated and somehow became part of the GEC empire to form GEC-General Signal {however something I have found on the internet suggests this company existed between 1954 - 2006]. I rather guessed that this was all happening about this time and that the HW was developed by whatever that company was actually called in those days- pretty sure that it is a development of the earlier SGE machines, but whether this was underway before the conglomeration or only once the merger had happened I have no idea; someone in the Signal Record Society is bound to know (even though the main interest tends to be in signalboxes and the railway operator rather than S&T engineering).
As and when I am with someone that might know (I believe that at the time it was first manufactured I was probably still in my pram- no comments ) I'll try to remember to ask. What I can tell you for free is that they are now actually manufactured largely in Poland but that wouldn't have been an option back then!
(06-05-2014, 04:01 PM)Fixer Wrote:(22-03-2011, 11:47 PM)PJW Wrote: Here is the HW information; now made by Alstom, previously GASL, previously GEC-General Signal, grew out of AEI, GRS, SGE etc; the point machine has outlived very many of the companies which manufactured it over the years.....
I hadn't forgotten- just distracted by change of job and other events!
Do you (or indeed anybody) know why the HW is named HW?
Also, does anybody know when it was first manufactured?
PJW