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Painted in oils on canvas. 2006. 200mm x 300mm. |
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‘Factory Masterwork’ This painting is based exactly on a black-and-white photograph taken at Phillips & Powis in 1939. It was one of a series of photographs showing the construction methods used for the Master I. The colour in the painting helps to differentiate between the wooden structure of the fuselage and the metal of the main fuselage jig. This jig assembly was itself a complex structure that was a masterpiece of the company’s jig-and-tool design department and allowed a wooden aircraft as sophisticated as the Master to eventually be built at a rate of fifty per month. Following the award of the contract for the Master I, the design and manufacture of literally hundreds of jigs took time, as did the training of hundreds of new workers. New managers from other industries introduced improved methods in aspects such as materials ordering and stock control. But it all took time and, although the exact numbers are not known, there is no doubt that the first Master 1s to leave the factory around the time of the outbreak of World War II were built before the introduction of the pioneering moving assembly line constructed at Woodley. At the beginning of the line, with the fuselage and wing centre section, complete with undercarriage, assembled together, each aircraft was placed on trolleys. These trolleys were linked together by cables attached to a winch at the end of the line. Each assembly stage, including necessary inspection operations, were timed to be completed within twenty minutes, after which the whole line was winched along one stage. On completion, each aircraft was wheeled from its trolley, which was taken back to the start, and pushed straight into the paint shop. ____________________ |