Maudslay, Henry

Maudslay, Henry

(born Aug. 22, 1771, Woolwich, Kent, Eng.—died Feb. 14, 1831, London) British engineer and inventor. The son of a workman, he became the inventor of machines fundamentally important to the Industrial Revolution, most outstandingly the metal lathe. He also invented methods for printing calico cloth and for desalting seawater for ships' boilers, as well as a measuring machine that was accurate to 0.0001 in. (0.00025 cm), and he designed and built many stationary and marine engines. Several outstanding engineers, notably James Nasmyth and Joseph Whitworth, learned their profession in Maudslay's shop. See also Joseph Bramah.

---

Maudslay, Henry 

Born Aug. 22, 1771, in Woolwich; died Feb. 14, 1831, in Lambeth, buried in Woolwich. British engineer.

At the age of 12, Maudslay began working in the shops of the Woolwich Arsenal. In 1797 he built a screw-cutting lathe with a sliding tool rest (which is mechanically moved by a lead screw) and with a set of gears. He thereby introduced into industry the ideas developed by A. K. Nartov and others and mechanized the production of screws and nuts. The subsequent mechanization of lathes accomplished by Maudslay and others led to the mechanized production of machine parts. In 1810 he founded a large machine-building factory, at which many new designs of lathes, steam engines, and other machines were developed. In 1815, Maudslay created a transfer line for the manufacture of ship’s blocks.