Mossend Iron and Steel Works

William Neilson, brother of Walter Neilson, established Mossend Iron Works in 1839-40. In 1850 The partnership was dissolved and John Neilson and William Neilson continued the business.

In 1880 a Siemens open hearth steel melting shop was started.

In 1882 after the death of William, Walter Neilson became the senior partner in the Mossend Iron and Steel Co

In the 1880s the Summerlee and Mossend works amalgamated as the Summerlee and Mossend Iron and Steel Co. After this Walter Neilson (1842-1896), William's second son, was left to carry on the business.

In 1886 Hugh Neilson II, who had run Mossend Iron Co, retired to set up Clydebridge Steel Works.

In 1899 a strike, lasting 14 months, shut the works. When the employees returned to work the plat was shut down indefinitely.

In 1906 William Beardmore and Co bought the Mossend Steelworks from the Summerlee and Mossend Iron & Steel Co for £50,000, to provide additional plate and sections for its shipyards. G T Neilson was retained as works manager.

Immediately after WWI production peaked when 2000 - 3000 people were employed.

In 1924 a slump in trade caused a complete shutdown.

In 1930 Berdmores informed Colvilles of their intention to break up the Mossend Works and transfer their business in plates, sections and rails to Colvilles.

In 1934 the works were acquired by Colvilles Ltd from William Beardmore & Co Ltd for £100,000. Some plant for semi-finished products and joists was transferred to Glengarnock and some ancillary plant was transferred to Dalzell for a new small bar and wire rod mill.

Works Plant

The works was set up in 1839-40 to make small sizes of merchant iron. By 1876 it had about 60 puddling furnaces and two plate mills and two reversing mills for plates and angle iron. It had a capacity of 50,00 tons of iron per year.

In 1880 five open hearth melting furnaces were built to allow the mills to roll steel rather than malleable iron.

In 1902 the works, by then no longer modern, were advertised for sale. Its plant then consisted of 12 melting furnaces, of between 20 and 40 tons, a 45 inch cogging mill, two reversing and one pull-over plate mill (with a combined capacity of 6,000tons/month), a 26 inch reversing and a 17 inch pull-over bar mill and a 10 inch guide mill.

In 1906, at the take over by Beardmore there were eight open hearth furnaces, a cogging mill, two plate mills and a sheet mill, all driven by beam engines. The output in 1906 was 45,838 tons of steel plate. The older plate mill, the sheet mill, the beam engines and some buildings were demolished. A three-high plate mill was installed, driven by a 1500 HP Oechelhauser gas engine. The cogging mill and the other plate mill were converted to electric drive. A power station was built, with Oechelhauser gas engines. The rest of the works was overhauled and the open-hearth furnaces rebuilt, all at a cost of £205,000.

In 1914 a bar mill, costing £10,000, was installed for making shell steel.

In 1915 Mossend No 2 Plant began construction, on 70 acres of agricultural land adjoining the works, with 16 new 50 ton open-hearth furnaces, section, roughing and finishing mills and a steel foundry. King George V opened the plant in 1917, when Sir William Beardmore described the new works as the largest and most complete of its kind in the United Kingdom.

In 1917 melting shop capacity was increased to make shell bar and ship plate.

Peak output was reached with outputs of 369,873 tons of steel slabs in 1917, 937,357 tons of steel ingots in 1919, 1,191,311 tons of steel bars and 1,931,271 tons of steel plate in 1920.

After the boom in 1920, losses in 1921 caused temporary closure, reopening in early 1922. A sudden drop in orders led to plant closure in July 1928 .

Mossend was sold to Colvilles in April 1934 for £100,000. However Colvilles soon found the plant to be completely obsolete and useless.

In December 1937 Colvilles, at the request of the Admirality, spent £400,000 on an extension to Mossend for heating and machining non-cemented armour plate, rolled at Dalzell plate mill. This was completed in February 1939 when Dr J M Ferguson was works manager.

About 1942 the Mossend No 2 mill was equipped for rolling alloy bars, at a cost of nearly £2 million. However, its capacity was never fully used and its redundancy was being discussed by mid 1943, once the WW2 demand for steel had peaked.

In 1944 No 1 cogging mill was closed completely, the last two electric furnaces went out of commission and No 2 mill was stopped.

The works was left with a few machine tools and in 1946 it was decided to build up an engineering shop capable of producing most of the new rolling mill plant and auxiliary machinery required by the Colville group of works. The Iron and Coal Trades Review of Colvilles in 1956, records 240 employees producing 300 tons of steelwork plant per annum, plus 1500 tons of miscellaneous machining. The engineering shop consisted of two main bays 850 ft long and 60 ft wide plus a lean-to extending the full length. A separate office block was situated nearby.

The Steel News reported the closure of Mossend Engineering Works on 27 March 1981. The agreement reached allows for the transfer of some employees to the centralised engineering workshop at Ravenscraig. The closure involved a loss of 114 job opportunities but efforts will be made to offer redeployment where possible. A number of employees will be retained on site at Mossend for a further three months to complete outstanding work including the transfer of some equipment.