Metallurgy and Engineering Museum in Chlewiska

The Chlewiska Ironworks on the road from Szudlów to Opocmo, 40 km south west of Radom is centred around a charcoal-fired blast furnace built by a French company between 1890 and 1892. It worked, with some pauses, until 1941 when it was closed by the German occupation authorities.

The stone structure is built in a Romanesque style and includes a lofty tower containing a water balance lift which raised raw materials to the charging area at the top of the furnace. It was the last charcoal blast furnace in Poland, and at its peak employed about 200 people. The blast furnace produced only about 10 tonnes of pig iron a day, some of which was used to make castings, including garden seats which are displayed. There was also a small forge in which pig iron was refined into wrought iron in puddling furnaces. Most of the buildings remain, together with their machinery, the charge preparation house, the blowing engines, leather and wooden bellows, steam blowing machines, and hot blast stoves, together with a narrow gauge railway which was used to move materials around the site. The ironworks was rescued from dereliction by the scholar Mieczyslaw Radwan who obtained funds in 1948 that enabled the roof to be repaired.

From the late 1950s the works became a concern of the Museum of Technology in Warsaw, and it was completely renovated in 2008-10. Some of the buildings are used for the display of machine tools, including milling and drilling machines, screw presses, lathes, and of Polish cars and motorcycles.