Bayko History

The History of Bayko can easily be divided into 3 distinct periods:-

1934 -1939 The pre-war era under the leadership of Charles Plimpton

1945 - 1959 The post war period under the leadership of Margaret Audrey Plimpton

1960 - 1964 The Meccano Period under the new ownership of Meccano Ltd

1934 -1939 The pre-war era under the leadership of Charles Plimpton

The Bayko system was invented and patented by Charles Plimpton in 1933. Charles had spent much of the late 1920's and early 1930's in a sanatorium with tuberculosis where he had come up with the idea of Bayko. In 1934 Charles established the Plimpton Engineering Company Limited in Liverpool set up, to manufacture the components, the majority of being made from Bakelite.

Bakelite or polyoxybenzylmethylenglycolanhydride to give it its technical name, is an early plastic. It was developed in 1907 by Belgian chemist Leo Baekeland who it was named after. One of the first plastics made from synthetic components Bakelite was used for its electricallynonconductive and heat-resistant properties in radio and telephone casings and electrical insulators, and also in such diverse products as kitchenware, jewellery, pipe stems, and children's toys.

Charles Plimpton named his new invention "Bayko Light Construction Sets" coming from the name "Bakelite" The first sets went on sale at the end of 1934. The Bakelite material was sourced from Bakelite Limited, a Birmingham supplier, and for the first few years of its life, Bayko was marketed by both Plimpton Engineering and Bakelite Limited Charles Plimpton took premises at, 15, Gibraltar Row, Liverpool 3, a location in Liverpool's industrial area just a street away from the Docks.

Charles Plimpton based his sets so that the sets built on each other, initially five sets were produced, "Set 1" through to "Set 5." Set 2 contained all the parts from set 1 plus extra parts following a system used another Liverpool toy maker Frank Horny who organised his Meccano sets in the same way 30 years earlier. The bricks were red and white, the bases brown, the windows dark green, and the roofs dark maroon. Charles began advertising Bayko in Meccano Ltd's Meccano Magazine  from September 1935, Regular advertisements appeared in the magazine over those next 25 years.

In 1935 three Ornamental Sets A, B and C were introduced that contained decorative parts to supplement the existing sets, including pillars, arches and curved bricks and windows. In 1936 a "Set 6" was introduced, a much larger set than "Set 5" that included all the new ornamental parts. By 1938, the Bayko sets were described as "Bayko Building Sets", and in 1939 all the existing sets were relaunched and replaced by a new series of six sets that incorporated new parts and a red, white and green colour scheme.

Production was interrupted in 1942 by World War II when the company switched to manufacturing for the war effort. When production resumed in 1946, the set range was reduced to three, "Set 0" to "Set 2". a "Set 3" was introduced in 1947.