City of Sunnyvale

Joshua Hendy Ironworks moved to Sunnyvale after the earthquake and fires of 1906 destroyed the San Francisco plant. Representatives of Sunnyvale, anxious to acquire industry and augment its population, enticed the company to move to Sunnyvale with the offer of free prune, apricot and pear orchard land for location of a new plant.

Initially the Sunnyvale plant produced mining equipment such as ball mills, ore cars, crushers, and hydraulic equipment. Later the plant produced large valves and gates for Boulder and Grand Coulee dams and for flood control, irrigation and power projects throughout the world.

During World War II the plant was greatly expanded to produce 754 steam engines to power 1/3 of all the Liberty ships built by the US Maritime Commission during World War II.

In addition, over 100 main propulsion turbine engines up to 8500 horse power, and reduction gears up to 180 inches in diameter were produced for fast Merchant Marine ships and nearly 500 turbine generators for power generation for ships.

To accomplish this, the plant expanded from 60 to 7500 employees, in excess of 1 million sq. ft. of manufacturing space.

The first work day of 1944 I was hired as a metallurgical engineer upon completion of my studies at Stanford University. My activity as a metallurgical engineer and later as manager of laboratories was to advise the mechanical engineers on the selection of suitable materials for production of the machinery being built. This also involved the establishment of process specifications for the manufacturing procedures for welding, nondestructive testing and quality control.

Hydraulic equipment continued to be designed and manufactured as well as a variety of mechanical equipment such as diesel engines, a three inch 70 caliber rapid fire antiaircraft gun, huge wind tunnel compressors requiring 216,000 horsepower to drive them, 130 ft diameter radio telescopes, nuclear power plant components, missile launching and handling systems for nuclear submarines, and pressure hulls for undersea vehicles.

In 1947 at the end of World War II, Westinghouse Electric Corporation purchased Joshua Hendy Ironworks to continue the manufacture of products started on Hendy and equip it for electrical utilities such as steam turbines for power generation, transformers, switch gear and motors.

The Sunnyvale plant was selected to produce pressure hulls for vehicles for Westinghouse Undersea Division under license to Captain Cousteau. On a more personal level, I will illustrate my function as a metallurgical engineer and manager of the laboratories by telling the story regarding the design, manufacture, and testing of the undersea pressure hulls.

First comes the selection of the hull material, of suitable strength and thickness to withstand the depths of operation in the sea. Next, the design must include the method for joining the two hemispheres to form a sphere, and for providing reinforcements for openings in the sphere for such reasons as access and view ports. Finally, the testing of the sphere is done to assure the integrity of the vehicle at operating depths.

In the case of a submersible vehicle known as Westinghouse Deepstar 4000, a 79 inch outer diameter sphere was fabricated from two spun hemispheres of 1 7/8 inch thick alloy steel plate and machined to 1.2 inch thickness.

The quality and type of material was specified by the metallurgist in the form of a materials specification. Then destructive tests using x-ray, ultrasonics and magnetic particle inspection are specified.

The metallurgist selects the welding process for joining the hemispheres and reinforcements and determines the process for inspection of the welds. Finally a pressure test is applied to the chamber at greater than the maximum operation depths of 4000 feet in the sea.

An illustration of the high degree of the inspection specified by the metallurgist to ensure high quality welds is an actual case of an insect attracted to the welding arc during multipass circumferential welding of the hemispheres. Welding was stopped, a small defect detected was removed by grinding and inspected before proceeding with subsequent weld passes. When final inspection of completed welds were made using x-ray, ultrasonic and magnetic particle tests, no evidence of the defects was found.

The history of the Sunnyvale plant of Joshua Hendy Ironworks represents several unique periods of development in Santa Clara Valley. First the passing of the food orchards which were king during the period of 1880 to 1940. Then came the heavy manufacturing period, reaching its peak during World War II, continuing through to the end of the 20th century as the population multiplied. The post war period also brought the era of technology and renaming the area Silicon Valley. Electronics, transistors, computers and the web are now king.

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