Drive motors at the Aliquippa Works facility of the Jones & Laughlin Steel Corporation. Pennsylvania. September, 1953.
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Drive motors at the Aliquippa Works facility of the Jones & Laughlin Steel Corporation. Pennsylvania. September, 1953.
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Crane No. 1 at the Jones & Laughlin Steel Corporation's Pittsburgh Works. Pittsburgh, PA. 1890.
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Interior view of the Mesta Machine Company plant. West Homestead, PA. 1905/1925.
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Charlie Chaplin approves this machine...
Brake beam assembling and dismantling machine at the scrap and reclamation shop of the Pittsburgh and Lake Erie Railroad Company. McKees Rocks, PA. January, 1950.
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Radial drill in the McKees Rocks Machine and Erecting Shop of the Pittsburgh and Lake Erie Railroad Company. McKees Rocks, PA. July, 1904.
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Doubling shear at the Mesta Machine Company. West Homestead, PA. 1905/1925.
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52-inch mill finishing stand at the Homestead Steel Works. Homestead, PA. 1927.
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Workers process a 90-ton ingot with a 10,000-ton forging press at Carnegie Steel Company's Homestead Steel Works. Homestead, PA. 1893-1895.
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Machine Department in the Mesta Machine Company. West Homestead, PA. 1905/1925.
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---Quote (Originally by Frank S)---
I wonder if James Burke did a series on the evolution of giant machines came about?
---End Quote---
There's an old saying “if I can measure it I can make it”. As already pointed out, you still need the tools to do the job. That said, how about a video series for today's media on the evolution of mechanical metrology going back to what we know of its role in the building of civilizations? The stories range from measuring the length of a kings foot to measuring the wavelength of light. Somewhere in the middle of that is the story of when, in the time of the first world war, the US navy sent one of its fastest destroyers to Sweden to bring back 4 sets of Johansen's gage blocks. Has such a production already been done? Anyone have a link?
I don't know if an adaptation of the book has been made, but Simon Winchester wrote an excellent book about it called "The Perfectionists:How Precision Engineers Created the Modern World: https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/35068671
Highly reccomend it; it's a fascinating story of the advance of modern metrology.
Furnaces at the Rust Engineering Company. Bethlehem, PA. 1968.
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44-inch blooming mill at the Homestead Steel Works. Homestead, PA. April, 1954.
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Forge department at the Mesta Machine Company. West Homestead, PA. March, 1918.
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Lunch time...
Planer in the McKees Rocks Machine and Erecting Shop. McKees Rocks, PA. April, 1904.
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Machine Department at the Mesta Machine Company. West Homestead, PA. 1905/1925.
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Homestead Steel Works. Homestead, PA. 1893.
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Doubling shear at the Mesta Machine Company. West Homestead, PA. 1905/1925.
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I'd like to see it in action!
Side view of a wire mesh machine at the American Steel & Wire Co. Donora Works. Donora, PA. 1915.
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Some afterthought guards...
Roll lathe at the Mesta Machine Company. West Homestead, PA. 1905/1925.
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160-inch mill at the Mesta Machine Company. Homestead, PA. February, 1944.
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Ballast cleaning machine. Monongahela Railway Company. Antram, PA. August, 1936.
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Rope drive at the Mesta Machine Company. 1905/1925.
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Mesta Machine Company forging plant. West Homestead, PA. March, 1918.
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Mesta Machine Company. 1905/1925.
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I like the crack repair...
Interior of the Homestead Steel Works at the Carnegie Steel Company. Homestead, PA. 1893.
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An overhead crane lifts a blooming mill at the Mesta Machine Company. 1905/1925.
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Roll Turning Department at the Mesta Machine Company. West Homestead, PA. 1905/1925.
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Mesta Machine Company interior view. West Homestead, PA. 1905/1925.
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Customer: I need a big Wacker-Smacker
Mesta sales person: What do you want to wack and how hard you want to smack it...
I'm speechless. All I can think of are subjects that are inappropriate for this forum.
I would love to see this machine in action.
I would bet that that machine had to be disassembled to be brought to where it went to work. It's on a pallet but I doubt there is a forklift big enough to lift it...