MEMORIAL MUSEUM.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXII, Issue 18994, 16 April 1925, Page 9

MEMORIAL MUSEUM.

PROGRESS OF THE WORK.

PRELIMINARIES FINISHED. SOLID FOUNDATIONS. 'll to preliminary work incidental to the erection of the. Auckland War Memorial and Museum, on tho summit of the most elevated part of the Domain, has now been completed. Tho foundations of all the outer walls arc down, and both tho masonry of the main frontage and tho brickwork of tho southern walls have been carried up well above the ground level. Every month should now bring about a perceptible difference in the height of the building, which, from its exalted situation, will form one of tho most conspicuous structures in the city, as becomes a block designed to commemorate one of the most momentous periods in the history of the world, and particularly of tho British Empire.

Surmounting the hill that overlooks Parnell, the memorial building will bo within view from most ports of the city and suburbs. Conversely, from it will bo gained an exceedingly comprehensive survey of the panorama stretching across Kemuera and Tamaki, and other outlying districts. Its principal facade will bo to tlie. north, and from its main entrance the Waitemata Harbour will be seen in all its beauty. As to the building itself, it will, when complete, rise 80ft. above the crown of the hill—say, to half the height of the construction tower from which the contractors are now working. Tho principal work at present in progress is that of raising upon the concrete foundations tho base of Coromandel granite which is to carry, for a height of about sgft., tho Portland stono of tho higher portions of the outer walls, on the main frontage and the east and west sides. The construction of tho internal piers, which are to be in reinforced concrete, has also just begun. Within the next week or two these piers will assume the appearance of a miniature forest, and then tho progress made with the building will become from week to week more manifest. The soil with which tho builders have had to deal is distinctly volcanic, and for the most part very regular in formation. Excellent foundations were found at. an average depth of about 12ft. Toward the western end of the building, however, there was a remarkable dip in the strata, suggesting the probability that it indicates the lip "f tho crater from which, in a distant geological age, the volcanic deposit was formed. .Not until a depth of 30ft. was reached was the bottom found sufficiently firm to carry the weight of the structure, but at. that depth., as in all other parts of tho site, it was everything that could be wished. The contractors, the Hansford and Mills Construction Company, have assembled on the ground one. of tho most modern plants yet employed on a Dominion building. For the cutting of the granite and sandstone there are a series of saws, electrically driven, some of them with diamond-pointed teeth : and the facing of the granite is finished off in a machine in-which a carborundum plane is the active agent. In the compounding and distribution of tho concrete the mechanism is entirely automatic in its action, from the moment of the dumping of the gravel and concrete into the mixer to its hoisting in the construction tower and its spread by means of conveyors to the most distant corners of the works. The time allowed to the contractors for the completion of their undertaking is three years, from last September.