MAKING NAVY ANCHORS

Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 93, 14 January 1919, Page 5

MAKING NAVY ANCHORS

FASHIONED BY MEN, NOT , MACHINES. \

At one time the Germans seemed ambitious to capture our anchor industry. High wages were'offered to\tempt British smiths to go.to Hamburg and Luback to shape the- anchors for the great Hamburg-Amerika liners then on the stocks. Fortunately for Britain the attempt failed, and the business remained this' side the North Sea.

The ancient anchor-shape was, and is, good enough for light shipping, but the mud-hooks of the present-day, mammoths must have a, more extensive grip ou the sea-floor. They aro vast pieces of metal work, in weight running iip to many owts. Battleships carry eight anohors. Anchor ■ smithing is about the ; only shipbuilding trade in which machinery has failed to oust men. To hold 29,000 tons of Queen.Elizabeth in a gale requires so/Bething heavy, strong, and reliable. A machine may roll huge armour plates, but for the laet resort, when two millions of public money and the lives of a thousand men are in jeopardy, "the reliability of a handwelded anchor is recognised. The blackest of black squads are the anchor smiths; their work is continually among white-hot metal, among fumes, smoke, glare, and dust. The hammers regularly wielded by them are the heaviest known in any industry, and as one watches the brawny giants swinging • their arms in the volcanic glow from the anvils one wonders whether such are recruited from a special raqe of Titans or are merely the development of the fittest, the cream of thousands of, failures.

The forging of eteel anchor-chains is a typical Black Country industry, though those for the ill-fated Lusitania were made at Pontypridd, in South Wales. The huge links weio nearly two feet long, the metal being 8J inches in diameter, and each link weighed 1601b. The Lusitania's main cable was about 2000 feet in length, and weighed 100 tons. Naval' statistics on the matter nre scnrcelj' available in war time, but one would judge that at least four times the quantity of chain would be carried by a Queon Elizabeth.

When it is remembered that each battleship and cruiser must for safety's sake, have at least eight full-sized anchors with chains to match (to say nothing of the needs of lesser craft and of the mercantile marine) the import-, ancp of the industry' will be the bettor appreciated.