Complete with gas-producers, stationary boiler, gas reheating furnaces and cranes, the estimated cost of installation was £15,100. The hammer foundations necessitated a cavity being dug to a depth of 18 feet, which was filled in with 321 tons of granite and cement, and upon which repose the base blocks, cast in steel and weighing a further 58 tons. This veritable monster commenced operations during the critical days of the early spring of 1918, and no sooner had the seemingly impossible been shown to be possible and the successful production of trunnion brackets had become "the means of great saving to the State," than there followed in quick succession orders for other and indispensable gun-mountings, such as front stiffening bands, upper sight brackets, trunnion-seatings, etc., etc. "Peace," as we know, "hath her victories no less renowned than war," and no sooner was the mantle of munition manufacture laid aside than efforts were once again concentrated on the production of locomotive parts, the whole of the Walschaerte valve gear appertaining to Mr. Cooke's latest express passenger engines, the well-known "Claughton" class, being now produced under the 4-ton drop-hammer. Standing in the immediate vicinity of the hammers ranged in convenient positions in regard to gas furnaces, "dummying" hammers, and "finning" or "trimming" presses, the average and intelligent visitor never fails to be impressed as he witnesses the operations in process, and notes the lightning rapidity with which, as if by the magic of a magician's wand, a bar or billet of gleaming, glistening whiteness is battered and transformed into some previously determined shape, curiously contorted, maybe, with corners, elbows, and recesses, ere the dazzling brilliance dims and fades, paling imperceptibly to lemon tint and orange hue, till finally the blood-red flush of angry sunset supervenes, and nothing remains but that the finished stamping should be trimmed and laid aside, gradually to resume the slate-grey cool of dawn. How natural it all seems, how almost childish in simplicity! And yet on second thoughts, how come these various shapes and forms, these corners, elbows, and recesses, these well-nigh perfect surfaces, pure and clean, free from blow-holes, dirt and scale? True, we know the crashing and resilient hammer blow is there, and then a little closer acquaintance with, or examination of, the hammer is all that is necessary, for this will reveal the fact that it is the effect of the blow on a pair of "dies," one of which is held rigidly in the "tup," the other on the base-block, that causes the metal at a moderate heat to "flow" completely into the impressions which are in the dies, and which ensure the fashioning of the article required.