Pictures From The Past

Great pics. Thanks for sharing. Mike
 
I am constantly amazed at what our predecessors did with machinery, and how big the machinery was. Great pics!
 
yea you didn't want to get caught up in the chips.
 
I wonder if any of these machines are still in use or even exist anymore. Do we in the U.S.A. still do machining on that scale?
 
A defense contractor I did contract work for in the Minneapolis area had 4 vertical boring/milling mills and one was 52 ft. in dia.. Boy do you feel small standing beside these when they have a gun turret on the table. Mind the chips !!!
 
I have one question, what size indicator do you use on those machines(seriously, what is the accuracy)? As far as current machines in the US I did some work I on a building about 20 years ago that was going to house a mill that would produce fans for large jet engines. The footing for the table went down ove 20 feet into the earth. When they were testing they would pick up vibrations from traffic passing by 100' away. The table was going to be about 25' in diameter. I do not remember the tolerance of the finished machine but is was crazy given the size.
 
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