2-888-567 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The Sash-Bar Machine, for the Great Exhibition Building, in Hyde Park, 1850. '...we find a communication from Mr. Paxton on this subject, dated 13th March, 1840, in which he says that, in its first state, it merely performed the part of a grooving-machine, but was subsequently improved so as to make the bar complete and that, by its adoption, the labour of twenty men for one year was performed, and a consequent saving of £1200 effected in labour alone. Now, we are not aware of sash-bars being completed by machinery before this period; and in the machine represented in the View, we perceive the same principle as that of Mr. Paxton's machine...by which double the amount of work is performed in a given time...Mr. Birch, of the Phoenix Saw-mills, near Cumberland-market, Regent's-park...has a contract for supplying skylight bars for the great Building...'. From "Illustrated London News", 1850.