Woolpit Steam day
In Woolpit, near Bury St Edmunds, is a village called Woolpit. Each year Woolpit hosts a steam Day which consists of many examples of the power of steam which preceded the modern internal combustion engine. This year, I took a trip and here are a few of the images from that afternoon - not that I can tell you much about the engines! Ransomes, Sims and Jefferies Limited was a major British agricultural machinery maker also producing a wide range of general engineering products in Ipswich, Suffolk including traction engines. So, a local connection here! The enterprise was started by Robert Ransome (1753-1830), a brass and iron-founder in Norwich before moving to Ipswich in 1789 where he started casting ploughshares in a disused malting at St Margaret's Ditches in Ipswich, with capital of £200 and one employee. As a result of a mishap in his foundry, a broken mould caused molten metal to come into contact with cold metal, making the metal surface extremely hard – chille...