The Science Museum at Wroughton

The Science Museum at Wroughton
Established	1979
Location	Wroughton, near Swindon, Wiltshire, England
Type	Museum store
Director	Molly Jackson
Website	www.sciencemuseum.org.uk
National Museum of Science and Industry
National Media Museum · National Railway Museum · (Shildon Locomotion Museum) · Science Museum · (Dana Centre, · Science Museum Swindon)

The Science Museum at Wroughton in Wroughton, near Swindon, Wiltshire, England is the large object store of The Science Museum a major tourist attraction in London. The Museum is not normally open for public viewing as it is basically several giant warehouses.

Origin

The Science Museum took ownership of the 545-acre (2.21 km²

) former RAF Wroughton airfield in 1979, to be used as a storage facility for the largest objects of the Science Museum. A collection of approximately 20,000 objects are currently kept in six of the hangers, from the first hovercraft to MRI scanners, and computers to (de-activated) nuclear missiles. The Science Museum at Wroughton is currently a museum store serving the conservation, object storage, and transportation needs of the Science Museum, and is not open to the public except during occasional Open Days or on monthly pre-booked group guided tours during the summer.

The museum has struggled to find a use for the site and to fund upgrades to the facilities. Most storage on the site lacks even rudimentary climate control.

The site is also home to the Science Museum Library and Archives, which are open to the public by appointment.

There is a consultation ongoing about disposing of some of the non core items from the tractor collection which were bought from a large disperasal sale several years ago when there was plan to open a dedicated agricultural museum. It is proposed that items that are not of very rare or special historical interest and were other exaples exist in other collections (both public and private) the excess stock will be offered to other museums with the remainder place up for auction.

Items in store

A few of the items in store here are featured in other articles. Items of concern to Tractors wiki are the Tractor collection and the Steam engines in the main but other vehicle and machinery related items are also in the collection here.

Steam engines

• Aveling & Porter no. 721
• Richard Hornsby & Sons no. 1851
• J&H McLaren & Co. no. 112 Traction engine of 1881
• Merryweather Fire engine of 1863
• Sentinel no. 1718 Steam wagon of 1917
• Tidman pair of organ engine & centre engines ~ 1900
• Fairground ride
• Steam plough

Tractors

• International Mogul
• Ferguson-Brown
• David Brown
• ?

Other Vehicles

• cars
• trucks
  • Scammell 100 tonner
• to add

See also

• List of Steam Machinery Manufacturers
• Museums List
• Shows and Meets

References / sources

• The Traction Engine Register 2008
• Old Glory Magazine Engines in Museums list

External links

• Science Museum website

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