Hi, my name is Tom, founder of Southampton Steam Works. I've been around steam since a very early age, starting when my dad used to take me to various preserved steam railways around England. I got properly involved with miniature steam at age 11 and started my Model Engineering venture at age 16, after joining my local club. 

At 18 I bought my first lathe, an Emco Unimat Sl. At the time, I was mainly working on 16mm Live Steam, so it was perfect for that scale. However, shortly afterwards I began to work on 3.5 and 5 inch gauge engines, so I was limited on what I could do. 

In 2023, a fellow member and friend built a workshop on the side of my house, and this gave me more room to play with. This was when SSW really took off. I got a Chester lathe as a Christmas present and have since been gathering more equipment and tools. Whilst I have no formal engineering qualifications, I have gained lots of experience with working with different metals, machines and engines.