Panama Canal Pintle Ball, 1914
date: label: Date made
content: ca 1911
notes: label: Description
content: Each of the great miter gates of the Panama Canal turn on pintle balls such as this one, a large steel hemisphere that sits inside a socket on the base of each gate leaf. For 25 years, beofre its replacement in the 1980s, this 800-pound pintle ball supported a 600-ton riveted steel gate at Gatun Locks, on the eastern shore of the Panama Canal.
label: Description
content: This ball lay in weeds near a maintenance area for the Canal, and was collected by the Smithsonian months before the Canal was turned over to the people of Panama. Today, pintle balls continue to support the gates of the Panama Canal's locks, although much else about the oiperation of the Canal has been modernized.
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
topic: label: Subject
content: Canals
setName: label: See more items in
content: Work and Industry: Mechanical and Civil Engineering
label: See more items in
content: Transportation
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: 1999.0317.01
label: accession number
content: 1999.0317
label: catalog number
content: 1999.0317.01
objectType: label: Object Name
content: pintle ball bearing
label: Object Name
content: pintle ball bearing from panama canal
physicalDescription: label: Measurements
content: overall: 18 1/2 in x 20 in; 46.99 cm x 50.8 cm