by Barrie Jones
Chapter Three
British Iron and Steel Federation (B. I. S. F) Steel Framed Houses
In the aftermath of the Second World War, Britain’s extensive post-war reconstruction programme faced a shortage of materials and skilled tradesmen, particularly carpenters and bricklayers. To overcome this, use was made of prefabricated materials, utilising factory production methods previously geared for the war effort. Construction techniques, in part, could be undertaken by an un-skilled workforce, and at its height the estate engaged over two-hundred and eighty workmen, mostly un-skilled, on the site’s construction.
The housing estate’s prefabricated houses, known by the locals as the `pre-fabs’ were mistakenly thought by many people to be for temporary use only. In addition to Ysgubornewydd, the Council embarked on a programme of construction of prefabricated properties on a large scale at Galon Uchaf (150 houses). Other smaller groups were constructed on such sites as; Canonbie (24), Brickfield Crescent (16), Cae Mari Dwn (26), Jones Terrace (16), Taff Glen View (22) and Queens Road (4). Prior to the construction of B.I.S.F. units the Council had constructed numerous Arcon prefabricated bungalows at Ynysfach, Rhydfach and Merthyr Vale.
In 1944 various non-traditional house construction systems were assessed by the Interdepartmental Committee on Housing (Burt Committee) to identify the most promising for immediate development. The B.I.S.F. steel framed house was one of those selected and two prototype houses ‘A’ and ‘B’ were erected at Northolt, Middlesex. Only type ‘A’ appears to have gone into production and a programme was planned for the construction of over 30,000 three-bedroom semi-detached houses in England and Wales, while over 4,000 were planned for Scotland. The programme was later extended to include 1,048 terraced properties, these merely being extensions of a pair of dwellings.
The type ‘A’ frame was fabricated from rolled steel sections with roof trusses of rolled steel or tubular sections. Of the claddings available, render on mesh for the ground floor and profiled steel sheet on the upper storey appears to have been adopted almost universally. The vertical ribs of the original cladding to the upper storey are a prominent feature that identifies B.I.S.F. houses. The roof was clad with profiled asbestos cement sheeting.
B.I.S.F. dwellings were usually built as two-storey semi-detached houses and the internal lining is of 3/8-inch plasterboard fixed to 2 x 1 inch timber framing secured to the steel framework. A glass fibre quilt 1 inch thick is sandwiched between the steel framework and timber framing.
A typical ‘prefab’; number thirty-seven, Wheatley Place, had the following layout and facilities:
Front door leading into the hallway with doors leading to the front room and kitchen, under the stairs near to the kitchen door was a wide cupboard housing the gas and electricity meters. Under the stairs there was space large enough for my mother to keep her Singer sewing machine with its metal treadle.
The kitchen was supplied with a gas cooker and fitted units; alongside the wall separated by the hall door were two pairs of full-length metal storage cupboards. Between the cooker space in the corner of the kitchen and the washbasin was a narrow cupboard in front of the boxed in soil pipe from the upstairs bathroom. This cupboard was used by my mother to store dusters, shoe polishes etc. Above the washbasin was the kitchen window that looked out onto the back garden. Under the washbasin was a gas tap that could be connected to a gas heated water boiler; the boiler was a galvanised cylindrical tub that was wheeled out on washdays from its place under the kitchen washbasin.
Leading from the kitchen was the dining room with a large window looking out onto the rear garden. From the dining room double doors lead into the front room that was dominated by a large almost full-length window looking out onto the front garden, all the windows in the house were metal framed with metal fittings. The front room was heated by a coal fire that backed on to the wall separating the dining room from the front room. The fireplace was dominated by a large mantelpiece that extended around the chimney flue and was made of pre-cast concrete. The fire could be lit with a gas jet fitted into the front grate instead of the traditional gas poker. This assisted the work of lighting the fire but to save gas, most people still relied on wood and paper and the trusty blower. Lighting the fire had its dangers, on one occasion when lighting the gas, blowback left me minus eyebrows and eyelashes. The fire served as the only direct room heating but with the aid of a small back boiler it heated the household hot water tank and three small radiators. These were narrow versions of the traditional heavy cast-iron radiators, one in the dining room and one each in the two larger bedrooms.
Upstairs on the landing was a window on the side of the house looking over the single storey side extension. Leading from the landing were three bedrooms and a bathroom. The bathroom situated at the rear and over the kitchen had a W.C., washbasin, and traditional white cast-iron bath. The large front bedroom housed the airing cupboard with hot water tank, situated alongside the chimney flue. It would not take much hot water use before this went cold and re-heating the water would take ages, most people eventually had electric immersion heaters fitted to boost the hot water. The front and back bedrooms were separated from each other by fitted wardrobes, a double in the front and a single in the back. These filled the space between the airing cupboard and the party wall. The smallest bedroom, the box room, was in the front over the hallway, to maximise space a fitted dressing table with two small drawers was built over the slope created by the rise of the stairs.
The side entrance into the house, known as the “back door”, leads into the kitchen through a porch. The porch was formed by the space made in a single-story side extension of the house between an external WC. and the storage shed. Part of this shed was a sectioned-off coalbunker; coal could be gathered from the porch by means of a small hatch at floor level. Unless the bunker was full, which would be very rare, collecting coal from the hatch was difficult and this hatch was rarely used and therefore the coal bucket was filled by trips into the dark shed. Over the years this large bunker would fill up with small coal and hunting for suitable coal lumps could take some time.
B.I.S.F. houses were innovative also in the provision of electricity; the Housing Manager reported to the Housing Committee in January 1948 that new patent electric wall sockets were fitted to the houses. These required plugs that had an additional third leg, a safety device in the form of a fuse, which was screwed into the plug. New tenants were not prepared for this innovation and the Housing Manager obtained permission to purchase one gross of the fuses and 500 plugs for sale to incoming tenants.
By the mid-1960s the external cladding of the ‘prefabs’ were becoming shabby and showing signs of rust. To counter this the Council embarked on a programme of ‘pebble dashing’ the cladding. This involved applying an adhesive to the metal and throwing small grain multi-coloured ‘pebbles’ over the adhesive. Later in the 1980s a renovation programme was conducted, this included replacing the asbestos roofing and improving the houses energy efficiency through window replacement and central heating installation.
From the 1980s council tenants could purchase their house under the Right to Buy (RTB) legislation, a favourable option as they would receive a significant reduction on the property’s value based on the length of their council tenancies. It was wise to delay purchase until the property was renovated. Several council tenants accepted this offer, and tenants continue to do so over the following decades. In total eight properties in Wheatley Place have been purchased under RTB, the three concrete houses and five ‘prefabs.’ The downside to RTB is that BISF properties are classed as of non-traditional construction and consequently mortgages are more difficult to secure for their purchase. Which may explain why fourteen properties in the street remain social housing after seventy-five years.
To be continued…..