This is my first post on the forum, I guess I could start with a brief presentation. In advance I’m sorry for the poorness of my English, I am learning and improving myself every day.
I have 29, come from France, Brittany more exactly, and I recently moved in London for working matters.
Before London, I lived in Paris for 5 years where I used to be nosy. I pretty well know the catacombs that I liked particularly for the historical parts and the amazing graffiti !!
Also, I like Paris rooftops where I used to go to admire the sunrise after a good bender.
More generally, I like places steeped in history (recent and old), that keep clues and traces of people who passed through, where it is possible to imagine the living days of the place.
I am really excited with the idea of discovering hidden and unsung parts of London and even more of all the UK.
2 months ago a friend came to visit me, here in the UK, and we moved for an exploration trip from London to Manchester. He is the photographer and unfortunately I still haven’t recovered his production.
Some pictures can be seen on his Facebook profile URBEXIONS.
Me, I prefer to do videos with my GoPro. I still made a couple of pictures, but unfortunately there is a lot of rubbish due to the lake of light.
We started with the famous Thamesteel in Sheerness, where the entrance had been a bit rough because of security guards patrolling over the place. Once inside it was easier to get around, we had to hide ourselves just once.
The site is really huge and it take us all the afternoon to visit almost the all.
A short history of the place coming from space invader post:
“This is a large and interesting complex, located at the northern end of a tight triangular junction with the Sheerness-on-Sea branch. First proposed in 1969, the construction of Sheerness Steel Works was given the go-ahead in 1971, building work beginning in that September on land largely occupied by Army playing fields. The building cost was priced at £10,000,000 (£105,921,790 at 2008 prices), and included swallowing up a goods yard recently made redundant by British Rail.
The works, a private venture under Canadian ownership, commenced operation in November 1972, and was designed to recycle scrap cars into steel coils and rods. The latter were for use in reinforced concrete and the steel mill had the capacity to process 180,000 tons of scrap metal per annum. It was envisaged that the mill’s yearly capacity could be increased to 400,000 tons within four years and, indeed, an additional £5,000,000 was invested in the works in 1975 to meet this target. Steel was produced using the electric arc process, and the mill remained a profitable venture until the second half of 1980. Much of the scrap metal dealt with originated from Mayer Parry Recycling of Erith, this being shipped down the Thames. Scrap metal and finished steel were also carried to and from the works by rail, and for this operation, new wagon batches – tailor-made for this type of traffic – were produced by ''Procor''. The rolling stock was leased by the steel mill at a time when there were few privately-owned wagons running on British Rail; indeed, this was one of a small number of works which was not part of the nationalised British Steel.
For many years the Sheerness Steel Mill was owned and operated by Canadian-based ''Co-Steel'', but with this company's struggling finances, it was sold to ASW Holdings Limited of Cardiff, Wales after a deal was finalised in December 1998. The latter could only keep the operation going until July 2002, the company subsequently going into receivership on 10th of that month - the end seemed nigh for the works. And in January 2003, Sheerness Steel was taken over by Thamesteel...â€
We began with the exterior part, several steps of footbridges around buildings that seemed to be the filtration system of the mill.
The inside is composed by different buildings pretty huge, corresponding to the different steps of the steel forming process (foundry, shaping, treatments …).
The foundry parts was the most interesting, you can find there disproportionate tools like this gigantic crucible below or others hooks and lifting devices.
View attachment 617018
View attachment 617019
I also appreciate the administration places which remain in good condition, the messy workshop, the big computer room in the middle of the shaping buiding.
This first UK exploration was amazing and put me in appetite for the following week.
Thanks for looking, I’ll add additional pictures to the post when I’ll get them back.
I have 29, come from France, Brittany more exactly, and I recently moved in London for working matters.
Before London, I lived in Paris for 5 years where I used to be nosy. I pretty well know the catacombs that I liked particularly for the historical parts and the amazing graffiti !!
Also, I like Paris rooftops where I used to go to admire the sunrise after a good bender.
More generally, I like places steeped in history (recent and old), that keep clues and traces of people who passed through, where it is possible to imagine the living days of the place.
I am really excited with the idea of discovering hidden and unsung parts of London and even more of all the UK.
2 months ago a friend came to visit me, here in the UK, and we moved for an exploration trip from London to Manchester. He is the photographer and unfortunately I still haven’t recovered his production.
Some pictures can be seen on his Facebook profile URBEXIONS.
Me, I prefer to do videos with my GoPro. I still made a couple of pictures, but unfortunately there is a lot of rubbish due to the lake of light.
We started with the famous Thamesteel in Sheerness, where the entrance had been a bit rough because of security guards patrolling over the place. Once inside it was easier to get around, we had to hide ourselves just once.
The site is really huge and it take us all the afternoon to visit almost the all.
A short history of the place coming from space invader post:
“This is a large and interesting complex, located at the northern end of a tight triangular junction with the Sheerness-on-Sea branch. First proposed in 1969, the construction of Sheerness Steel Works was given the go-ahead in 1971, building work beginning in that September on land largely occupied by Army playing fields. The building cost was priced at £10,000,000 (£105,921,790 at 2008 prices), and included swallowing up a goods yard recently made redundant by British Rail.
The works, a private venture under Canadian ownership, commenced operation in November 1972, and was designed to recycle scrap cars into steel coils and rods. The latter were for use in reinforced concrete and the steel mill had the capacity to process 180,000 tons of scrap metal per annum. It was envisaged that the mill’s yearly capacity could be increased to 400,000 tons within four years and, indeed, an additional £5,000,000 was invested in the works in 1975 to meet this target. Steel was produced using the electric arc process, and the mill remained a profitable venture until the second half of 1980. Much of the scrap metal dealt with originated from Mayer Parry Recycling of Erith, this being shipped down the Thames. Scrap metal and finished steel were also carried to and from the works by rail, and for this operation, new wagon batches – tailor-made for this type of traffic – were produced by ''Procor''. The rolling stock was leased by the steel mill at a time when there were few privately-owned wagons running on British Rail; indeed, this was one of a small number of works which was not part of the nationalised British Steel.
For many years the Sheerness Steel Mill was owned and operated by Canadian-based ''Co-Steel'', but with this company's struggling finances, it was sold to ASW Holdings Limited of Cardiff, Wales after a deal was finalised in December 1998. The latter could only keep the operation going until July 2002, the company subsequently going into receivership on 10th of that month - the end seemed nigh for the works. And in January 2003, Sheerness Steel was taken over by Thamesteel...â€
We began with the exterior part, several steps of footbridges around buildings that seemed to be the filtration system of the mill.
The inside is composed by different buildings pretty huge, corresponding to the different steps of the steel forming process (foundry, shaping, treatments …).
The foundry parts was the most interesting, you can find there disproportionate tools like this gigantic crucible below or others hooks and lifting devices.
View attachment 617018
View attachment 617019
I also appreciate the administration places which remain in good condition, the messy workshop, the big computer room in the middle of the shaping buiding.
This first UK exploration was amazing and put me in appetite for the following week.
Thanks for looking, I’ll add additional pictures to the post when I’ll get them back.
Nice introduction, and look forward to seeing more! If you ever want to get up to anything in London give us a shout.
(which sometimes can be a bit of a chore with some "native" english speakers.)
