Description:Reverse general view of pumping engine for John Sparrow & Co., Cockshead Colliery, Norton–in–the–Moors, near Burslem, Staffordshire, May 1792.
This drawing, of an engine with a 48½ inch cylinder, for Cockshead Colliery, in Staffordshire, shows just how elaborate and sophisticated Boulton & Watt’s pumping engines had become by the 1790s. Note that the air pump and the plug tree were worked by a second 'air pump beam' mounted on the back wall of the engine house.
This drawing is part of the Archives of Soho, held at Birmingham City Archives [Ref. MS3147/Portfolio/5/566]