BAE Systems in olden times

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I found this in the loft yesterday with a folder of BAe brochures from 1982, and it got me thinking about how times have changed. I thought it might be of interest to some of you.

The folder was given to me by a guy from Personnel in March of that year after I'd been interviewed for a job. The interview was held at Warton, but if I was successful I could have ended up working at any of the sites on the list. BAe had only been in existence for five years, which explained why the interviewers kept referring to "BAC" - to them, their colleagues at what used to be Hawker Siddeley and Scottish Aviation (SAL) were still different tribes!

The list relates to Aircraft Division only. BAe Dynamics was a separate division with sites at Stevenage, Lostock, Bracknell and perhaps other places too. I'm not sure how SAL fitted into the organisation. This was a long time before BAe went on to take over, or merge with, Royal Ordnance and Rover, let alone GEC/Ferranti and the shipbuilding/submarine operation.

Most of the Aircraft Division sites had their own active airfield. I think I'm right in saying that only Chester, Hurn and Warton are still operational for flying.

P.S. If you're wondering about "P110", it was a paper project that morphed into ACA then EAP then EFA/Typhoon.

BAe Aircraft Group employees per site 1982 by Dan Sprague, on Flickr

  

[ametyst]

And now, BAe Systems employs 87,800 in total. Of this total, 34,100 are employed in the UK.

In addition to this (and included in the historic figures as BAe), Airbus Industrie employs 12,500 people in the UK.

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I didn't realise so many BAES people are currently employed abroad, presumably mainly in the Gulf and USA.

One of the things that struck me about the 1982 figures is how much subcontracting between sites was going on, presumably to balance the workloads at different stages of each product's life cycle. However the city slickers probably already had plans for Kingston, as it was obviously more lucrative to sell the land than keep production going there. Indeed BAe bought Ballast Nedam later in the 1980s to help handle development of UK and Saudi sites (including many acres of Royal Ordnance sites). And as time went on the Al Yamamah contract with Saudi proved to be a goldmine.

[Deleted]

Very interesting. I joined BAe in 1981 and at one time or another, went to most of the sites on that list, including working at three of them; Chadderton, Woodford and Hatfield, with occasional work-related visits to Brough, Chester and Warton. Strange that there's no mention of Samlesbury, though. Also sad that so many of those are now closed.

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Yes garstonboy it's a shame that so few sites remain. The Preston Strand Road factory was a proper manufacturing place, and I imagine Chadderton was similar. I'd love to have visited Hatfield because of its associations with the Comet and Trident, but never managed it. I'm pleased I was able to visit the big hangar at Woodford where Lancasters and Vulcans were assembled. Gone now, replaced by new housing.

By the way, Samlesbury is on the list, under the Warton heading.

[8miles27]

1982 - the year I left Warton after 8 years in the Aerodynamics Department working on the MRCA/Tornado and latterly on the EFA. A change of career then but managed to get my PPL with the Warton flying club whilst there at the incredible rate of about £7.50 per hour - organised thru Westair at Blackpool with instructors Phil Stock and Jim Padia and occasionally with John Westerby and mostly on C150's G-ATRN and G-BHFI which is still with the club today.

garstonboy - Samlesbury listed under Warton.

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Yeah, I see Samlesbury now. Of course, it was always regarded as a satellite to Warton, although those who worked there had different opinions!

[plug]

Yes it was regarded as a subsidiary of Warton then, because the top brass were based at Warton. I worked at both sites so I could see it from both sides. Samlesbury was jokingly referred to as "The Farm", either affectionately or dismissively, depending on whether you worked there.

[jetdragon]

Olden Times...1982

Makes me practically pre-historic


The F111 refurbs at Filton were done in the Brabazon hangar IIRC - used to see (and try to log) them when getting off the inter-factory shuttle from Chester.

Used to deal regularly with Filton, Brough, Hamble and Weybridge who provided sub-assemblies and components for our Airbus wings amongst other things. Also visited Hatfield a few times when working in the 125 project office.

Good days, even if it seems a lifetime ago now.

JD