Yorkshire Engine Company - Closure and Life After Death

Closure and Life After Death

Locomotive construction ended in 1965. It is not recorded exactly why the works was closed but three facts seem to have all had an influence on the decision. Firstly the market for new locomotives was shrinking rapidly with a number of other manufacturers closing around this time. Secondly, most of the USC works were fully equipped with YEC locomotives. Thirdly, nationalisation of the British steel industry was to take place in 1967 and it is unlikely that the locomotive business was wanted as part of the new corporation.

Several locomotives under construction at the time of closure left the works before they had been completed. These locomotives were destined for USC steelworks which had the capability to complete the construction work in their own engineering works.

The rights to the YEC designs and the good will of the business were sold to Rolls-Royce ‘Sentinel Division’ at Shrewsbury who had previously supplied a high proportion of diesel engines used by YEC and were a competitor in the industrial locomotive market. In 1967 three locomotives were bought from Shrewsbury for use at Scunthorpe Steelworks, these were built to the Janus design to match the many similar locomotives there built in Sheffield. A fourth locomotive, to a different YEC design, was supplied to AEI in Manchester.

When Rolls-Royce hit financial problems in 1971 they stopped all locomotive work and the YEC designs, along with those for Rolls-Royce locomotives passed to Thomas Hill at Kilnhurst, near Rotherham who had been agents for Rolls-Royce for some time. (Thomas Hill built three locos to Yorkshire design, for the Durgapur Steel Works in Eastern India).

The former Yorkshire Engine Company works at Meadowhall, Sheffield was transferred to McCall and Company another part of the United Steel Companies group. Reinforcing bars (for concrete) were produced here. The works passed to Rom River Reinforements in the mid 1990s but was closed early in the 21st century when the roof of the main building was deemed to be beyond repair. Subsequently the works has been completely refurbished and is now (2009) occupied by the long established engineering firm of Chesterfield Special Cylinders

Locomotives returned to the site on a regular basis between 1988 and 2001 when the South Yorkshire Railway Preservation Society used the few remaining railway lines in the Meadowhall works to load and unload numerous preserved locomotives that were moved by Lorry (the lines between the buildings were set into the roadway). A number of these locomotives were products of Yorkshire Engine Company, including YE2480, the first diesel locomotive they built.