Sheffield Refractories

Sheffield Refractories Limited is a UK based Monolithic Refractory Manufacturer and Installer based in Sheffield, South Yorkshire. The company's origins date back to the late 1890s when George Johnson Refractories was established in Sheffield. George Johnson Refractories traded until 1976 when the company name was changed to Sheffield Refractories... Limited. The change of name coincided with the retirement of the final member of the Johnson family. The new owners were looking to re-launch the business and moved to a new manufacturing location in Dinnington which is on the North East side of Sheffield, near Worksop. The company is still manufacturing at this site today although a second manufacturing plant has also subsequently been established a few miles away. Sheffield Refractories Limited continued to trade as a private company until the mid-1980s when it was acquired by Coated Electrodes, a previous British Steel Chemicals operation that had been purchased from British Steel by the Management Team. By the mid-1980s the Coated Electrodes Management Team had taken the company on to the Unlisted Securities Market and was looking for suitable local acquisition targets that were operating in the same Steel Market. Unfortunately shortly after the Sheffield Refractories acquisition the core business of Coated Electrodes collapsed, (water spraying electrodes replaced coating techniques) and the company, including Sheffield Refractories was purchased by Kembrey, an Electrical engineering Company who had a specific interest in two of the other Coated Electrode acquisitions. Subsequently, some seven years later, Chemring plc, a listed Electrical Engineering and Defence specialist acquired Kembrey plc. These were potentially volatile years for Sheffield Refractories with multiple changes of ownership. However, during this period the company operated as an autonomous unit and continued to expand and progress. Around 1996 Chemring decided that a Refractory Manufacturer did not really fit with their core operations and ...Read More