Armstrong Whitworth was founded in 1847 in Newcastle upon Tyne to produce hydraulic machinery, cranes and bridgesbut this was soon expanded to cover artillery. Most notable of the latter was the Armstrong breech-loading gun, with which the British Army was re-equipped after the Crimean War. In 1882, it merged with the shipbuilding firm of Charles Mitchell to form Armstrong Mitchell & Company and at the time its works extended for over a mile along the bank of the River Tyne.
Armstrong Mitchell merged again with the engineering firm of Joseph Whitworth in 1897. The company expanded into the manufacture of cars and trucks in 1902, and created a department in 1913 which later became became the Armstrong Whitworth Aircraft subsidiary in 1920.
In 1927 the organisation merged with Vickers Limited to ted to form Vickers-Armstrongs.
fter the First World War, Armstrong Whitworth converted its Scotswood Works to build railway locomotives. From 1919 it rapidly penetrated the locomotive market due to its modern plant.[
Its two largest contracts were 200 2-8-0s for the Belgian State Railways in 1920[7 and 327 Black 5 4-6-0s for the LMS in 1935/36. A number of thses LMS engines have been preserved.
AW also modified locomotives. In 1926 Palestine Railways sent six of its H class Baldwin 4-6-0 locomotives to AW for conversion into 4-6-2 tank locomotives to work the PR’s steeply graded branch between Jaffa and Jerusalem.[9] PR also sent another six H Class Baldwins for their defective steel fireboxes to be replaced with copper ones.
AW’s well-equipped works included its own design department and enabled it to build large locomotives, including an order for 30 engines of three types for the modernisation of the South Australian Railways in 1926. These included ten 500 class 4-8-2 locomotives, which were the largest non-articulated locomotives built in Great Britain, and were based on Alco drawings modified by AW and SAR engineers. They were a sensation in Australia.[10] AW went on to build 20 large three-cylinder “Pacific” type locomotives for the Central Argentine Railway (F.C.C.A) in 1930, with Caprotti valve gear and modern boilers. They were the most powerful locomotives on the F.C.C.A.
AW obtained the UK license for Sulzer diesels from 1919, a
nd by the 1930s was building diesel locomotives and railcarsA total of 1,464 locomotives were built at Scotswood Works before it was converted back to armaments manufacture in 1937.
Andrew Barclay built locomotives preserved outside Britain go to Preserved Outside Britain by Builder – Armstrong Whitworth
Preserved British Steam Locomotives 