Baines Machine & Repair Works
4162 James Street

The Spirit of Bothwell Article By Jodi Robb Oct 3, 2007

A step back in time can happen when you tour Albert Baines; machine shop that is still operating on the original machinery it began with over 100 years ago, in Petrolia. Baines is the 3 rd generation to work in the machine shop and has done repair work on the original flywheel that operates the equipment at the Bothwell-Zone Museum. Baines Machine Shop was started in 1914 by Albert’s father and grandfather, with the majority of their work being done to manufacture parts of the oil drilling industry. Today they are the only machine shop that still manufactures the parts to operate the original drilling equipment found at the oil wells located in Petrolia, Oil Springs, Bothwell and around the world.

Baines’ brother in law, Harry Cooper who has been working at the machine shop for 50 years says, “What is unique about the machine shop is that we can produce special orders to fit the needs of the oil drillers, We can adapt our machines to produce only one or two of the parts needed as opposed to the larger machines shops that require an order to have a minimum number of parts before they can manufacture the piece.

”The machine shop is still much the same as it was when the Baines began their business, as the machines are operated by a leather belt and pulley system with all the gear drives located overhead of the equipment. The only exception is that the pulley system was converted to hydro in 1920 as opposed to the original gas engines that ran the system.

The main products that are produced at the machine shop are the brass and steel fittings and valves that control the flow of the oil. During the process of manufacturing the parts, Baines and Cooper manually set the lathes and presses to cut the required threading and shape of each part. “We rely heavily on the basic math as we set everything by hand and each and every part must have an accurate fit as there can be a lot of pressure behind the valves. It is almost second nature for now but we have had several apprentices who quickly realized that important of learning one’s time tables and fractions,” Cooper joked. The machine shop also produces leather fittings; gaskets and belts that can be found on pulley operated pumps from water to oil. Each leather piece is cut and set by hand using punches and mallets and are then shaped according to the specifications. “The hand work is becoming a lost art from today as there are computers and machines that can calibrate themselves with a few punches of a key pad but here at Baines, the newest machine that we purchased was a lathe 20 years ago. That one quit on us a couple of years ago and we never bothered to fix it as it could never stand up to the originals,” Cooper said. “I guess that in the long run nothing can still beat the antiques of the place. Heck, even the two guys running this place are antiques,” he joked.