In the previous chapter it was stated that John Wilkinson, of Bersham, made the steam engine commercially possible by first boring Watt’s cylinders with the degree of accuracy necessary, and that his boring machine was probably the first metal-cutting tool capable of doing large work with anything like modern accuracy. Although Wilkinson was not primarily a tool builder but an iron master, this achievement alone is sufficient to make him interesting to the tool builders of today. He was born in 1728. His father made his financial start by manufacturing a crimping iron for ironing the fancy ruffles of the day. John Wilkinson first started a blast furnace at Belston and later joined his father in an iron works the latter had built at Bersham, near Chester. By developing a method of smelting and puddling iron with coal instead of wood-charcoal, he obtained an immense commercial advantage over his rivals and soon became a powerful factor in the iron industry. Later, he built other works, notably one at Broseley, near Coalbrookdale on the Severn. One of the important branches of his work was the casting and finishing of cannon. It was in connection with this that he invented the boring machine referred to. He bored the first cylinder for Boulton & Watt in 1775. Farey, in his “History of the Steam Engine,” says: In the old method, the borer for cutting the metal was not guided in its progress,[12] and therefore followed the incorrect form given to the cylinder in casting it; it was scarcely insured that every part of the cylinder should be circular; and there was no certainty that the cylinder would be straight. This method was thought sufficient for old engines; but Mr. Watt’s engines required greater precision. [12] See Fig. 1. Mr. Wilkinson’s machine, which is now the common boring-machine, has a straight central bar of great strength, which occupies the central axis of the cylinder, during the operation of boring; and the borer, or cutting instrument, is accurately fitted to slide along this bar, which, being made perfectly straight, serves as a sort of ruler, to give a rectilinear direction to the borer in its progress, so as to produce a cylinder equally straight in the length, and circular in the circumference. This method insures all the accuracy the subject is capable of; for if the cylinder is cast ever so crooked, the machine will bore it straight and true, provided there is metal enough to form the required cylinder by cutting away the superfluities.[13] [13] Farey: “Treatise on the Steam Engine,” p. 326. 1827.