A Visit to the Exide and Chloride Battery Works
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LAST Tuesday we were one of a bril:ileged party of guests who were conducted around the extensive works of the Chloride Electrical Storage Co., Ltd., at Clifton JunctiOn, near Manchester.
Battery manufacture may be looked upon as one of the key"industries of this country, and it is not until one has had the opportunityof examining in detail the making of the many and various types of accumulator: produced by this company that one can realize the enormous extent of this industry and the number of needs it has,.. to meet.
As an example of the progress which is, being made by the company, it may be mentioned that during the past four and a half' years the area of the land occupied by the works, etc., has increased by 40 per. cent. (it is now 37 acres). and the covered area by 100,000 sq. ft. Some 2,000 workpeople of both. sexes, are employed, besides thousands in other industries which are kept busy, by the huge contracts for raw and partially finished materials.
This works, however, does not by any means represent the full measure of the company's energies, as there are branches in all the most important cities in the British Isles, as well as in Bombay, Calcutta, Sydney, Christchurch, Cape Town and Copenhagen, and a va-srenterprise concerned with Exide service, with stations employing skilled men who have been trained at the works, or at overseas depots, in the repair and maintenance of batteries, for which the charges' are on a fixed scale. There are over 600 of these service stations in the British Isles, and more than 8,000 distributed throughout the world. The health and welfare of the employees are matters which have received the utmost consideration. As many of them are lead workers, these naturally come under safeguards enforced by regulations, but the measures adopted go far beyond the requirements of Government departments. They include a dental clinic, a well-arranged canteen and kitchen ,(the cost of the service for which is borne by the company), a library, a recreation club and sports grounds. Further examples of this good work are the allocation of a long-service gift of £100 to each employee with 25 years' service to his credit, gifts to women employees on marriage, annual holidays with pay, a non-contributory pension scheme, a benefit fund, and evening classes with grants to students to cover or help in the purchase of text books. The batteries which were seen in course of manufacture ranged from the tiniest _wireless . cell to huge cells, weighing half a ton each, for submarines, the total weight of batteries used in a single vessel of this type being equivalent to the displacement of a complete submarine of the earliest type constructed. Four general types of bat: tery aremade at Clifton Junction— the Chloride and Chloride Plantide for statiOnary installations, such as lightingplants, Lux for lighting railway trains, Exide for motor vehicles and wireless receivers, and Exide-Ironclad for the under-water propulsion of submarines, the power supply to dectri5 vehicles, trucks and trains and the lighting of motorbuses and motor coaches. It was interesting to find that the company utilizes its own fleet of battery propelled vehicles for transport work between Clifton Junction and the Manchester Ship Canal Docks at Trafford Park, whilst .electric trucks are employed for Service within the works.