Wichita eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1886-1890, 1889-05-12
MAKING A CANNON.
How Big Steel Rifles Are Manu-
featured.
The Washington Navy Yard Turned Into
an Immense Gun Factory-A Monster
That VIII Send a Ton Shot
Ten Miles.

nils, Wnero GDc SlF Is Dlack Win SuOkG
by day and lurid with flame by night.
the first step in the process Of gun
making is to be witnessed. In the
great rolling mill of the Midvale
Company. huge masses Oflsteel, weigh
ing at first 10000 pounds, are ham,
mered and rehammered' until cast In
an ingot of little more than half that
weight. These ingots are about
twenty-six feet long and about eight
inches in diameter. When each long
column Of steel is ready to be turned
over to the Government, piece of it
is cut off by the Government inspector
stationed at the rolling mill and sent
to the testing room at the,W Washington
factory.
The piece of steel sent to this city is
about four inches in length. An inch
of this at each end colsistssOf thread
like screw. and between these is q
thinner cylinder OF plain steel. When
sample duly marked is taken from
its box. each end is screwed into the
rms of tall testing machine. cap
.,ble of testing up to 100000 pounds.
BY a system of levers, scientifically
arranged. one man standing by the
wheel, which is not much larger in
diameter than the length Of ones
hand, can pull the bars apart, and
thus stretch the little column of steel
until finally it snaps apart with noise
like a good-sized Fourth of July fire.
cracker.
The steel ingot has now been forged,
inspected. and shipped, and is in the
gun factory awaiting further disposi-
ton. Although it..weighs something
like 5000 pounds the huge derricks
lifts it easily. and it is placed upon
ono of the gigantic lathes with which
the shops around. At one end of the
lathe a steel drill or bit is fastened.
Then the great wheel revolve, and
slowly but steadily the drill begins to
convert the solid mass of steel into a
tube. At first the hole which is bored
s only 81 inches in width. 1t leaves
a rough, jagged surface, which in turn
is smoothed down by drill of finer
build.
1t is easy to sum up this work in
a sentence, and yet at the very fastest
the lathe must turn and turn for two
weeks before its work is done Then
the expert ordnance officers take hold
of it. By the aid of powerful electric
lights they examine every square inch
of the tubes interior, looking carefully
for defects, for inequalities in the
metal. and for gouges. 1t is to the
credit of American steelmakers that
up to this time not single tube has
been returned to the manufacturers.
Occasionally theometal in the tube is
warped and the twist in the grain
causes trouble, but even this, under
the methods applied by the naval Off
GERS, does not prove fatal to the gun.
From being a solid mass of steel the
future gun has now been changed into
something that resembles very much
a common water pipe. 1t has been
star gauged-that is, every inch of the
interior has been examined with an
instrument which resembles, on large
scale the little vest-pocket appliances
which are sold to keep ones watch
from being stolen. 1t is a long rod
with cone on the end, and whenever
the rod is pulled back three long spikes
shoot out from the cone and touch the
side of the gun. When they thus come
in contact with the steel the record of
evenness or inequality is registered at
happens to be 365 inches long. as the
ten-inch guns are. it can be seen that
this single act OF star gauging is one
which occupies no little time and labor.
Having been. therefore, subjected
to all of these tests and inspections,
the tube is carried over to the foundry
and there placed muzzle upward in a
deep pit ready TO await its jacket.
One need not be an expert to under
stand that the greatest force to be
resisted is concentrated in the rear of
the gun where the powder is fred and
the shell starts on It's mission of death.
So enormous are the charges now
placed in q gun that the pressure TO
the square inch in .he powder cham
Der Is now no less than fifteen tons.
The stately Washington Monument, a
mass Of stone rising $50 feet in the
air, has pressure Of only five tons to
the square foot, and this comparison
perhaps best illustrates the enormous
force OF the powder when converted
into gas.
To withstand this shock the tube of
the gun is strengthened by a jacket, a
wall OF steel about a foot and a half
thick. placed around II directly over
the powder chamber. While the tube
was being bored this jacket was also
undergoing q similar operation, so
that when the tube was at last lowered
into the pit the jacket was ready TO be
placed in the furnace, there heated.
and finally, after having been hoisted
from its heated bed by crane, IS
slipped down upon the tube. Coils
of copper wire filed with water play
upon the heated band OF metal, caus- F.
ing it to shrink around the cold tuba /
with an embrace destined 10 last for !
ever.