the Crymlyn Burrows factory was sold to the Ford Motor Company in 1965, and used to manufacture car parts. British Leyland Prestcold, along with other parts of Pressed Steel, was absorbed into BMC in 1966 which became part of British Leyland in 1969. Prestcold passed into Leyland Special Products after the Ryder Report. This once again put it back in the same ownership as the former Morris Motors sites adjacent to the Cowley factory. Prestcold was part of the Leyland Special Products division, later SP Industries, along with diverse interests such as Aveling-Barford and Nuffield Press. Under British Leyland, Prestcold acquired the Glasgow-based industrial refrigeration specialist L Sterne and Co for £3m in 1968, which doubled the size of the refrigeration business. Divestments in British Leyland left Prestcold as one of the only non-automotive manufacturing divisions within the group, but it was retained due to its research on air conditioning for cars, which was seen as strategically important. Later ownership There were a number of acquisitions for the company, including the Gardiner Refrigeration and Air Conditioning company in 1975, and in 1976, Prestcold bought the Searle company from Hall Thermotank, giving the company around half of the UK's capacity for building heat exchangers. The former L Sterne factory in Glasgow was closed in 1979 with the loss of 900 jobs. In 1981 Prestcold was acquired by Suter plc, a diverse engineering and chemicals company based in Grantham, Lincolnshire, and headed by David Abell, the former managing director of Leyland Special Products. Abell had to resign his post as then Managing Director of BL Commercial Vehicles because of the potential conflict of interest created. In 1984, Prestcold was sold by Suter to the American Copeland Corporation (now part of Emerson Electric), with the Prestcold brand disappearing in the 1990s from the UK. The Theale site still manufactures compressor systems for Emerson. The Prestcold brand name was also used for household refrigerators by McAlpine Prestcold Limited in New Zealand. Factories Cowley, Oxfordshire - 1933-1961 Theale, near Reading, Berkshire Crymlyn Burrows, Swansea - 1961-1965 Hillington, Glasgow, Scotland - until 1979 References External links Prestcold Packaway refrigerator entry at sciencemuseum.org.uk Defunct manufacturing companies of the United Kingdom Engineering companies of the United Kingdom Home appliance manufacturers of the United Kingdom Organisations founded by Viscount Nuffield Refrigerators