At the age of 20 Wilkinson moved to Staffordshire and built Bilston's first iron furnace. It was at his father's factory at Bersham, Denbigh, Wales, that he constructed his new machine (1775) that could bore engine cylinders and cannon barrels with unequaled accuracy. Its precision enabled Watt to perfect his steam engine. Wilkinson, in turn, used the first steam engine built by Watt and James Moulton to drive a large air pump in his large-scale manufacture of wrought iron at Broseley, Shropshire.

Another Wilkinson innovation (1787) was an iron-hulled barge—a sensation at the time—to transport the heavy ordnance he was manufacturing for the government. Wilkinson taught the French how to bore cannon from solid castings; (casting) and he cast all the tubes, cylinders, and ironwork required for the Paris waterworks. Fittingly, he was buried in a cast-iron coffin of his own design.