Engine erectors were scarce and could be well paid. The temptation to spend their wages on beer must have been great.
Image: British Library
The most advanced machines
Watt's engines were the most advanced machines of their time, requiring new levels of workmanship.
A shortage of suitably trained engineers made erecting a Watt engine difficult. Working in Glasgow on his experimental engines, Watt complained that:
'the work done is slovenly... our workmen are bad, and I am not sufficiently strict'.
A later mill-owner complained that one of Watt's men spent 'more time in the Ale house than at the engine'.
A new way of building engines was badly needed.
