Heavy Metal

Stationed aboard USS Long Beach, CGN-9 deployed to West-Pac.

USS Long Beach, CGN-9, Fine, storied, highly capable ship for many years. Thanks for your service Polara_500:)

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Source: USS Long Beach (CGN-9) - Wikipedia

USS Long Beach (CLGN-160/CGN-160/CGN-9) was a nuclear-powered guided missile cruiser in the United States Navy and the world's first nuclear-powered surface combatant. She was the third Navy ship named after the city of Long Beach, California.

She was the sole member of the Long Beach-class, and the last cruiser built for the United States Navy to a cruiser design; all subsequent cruiser classes were built on scaled-up destroyer hulls (and originally classified as destroyer leaders) or, in the case of the Albany-class, [said to be] converted from already existing cruisers.

Long Beach was laid down 2 December 1957, launched 14 July 1959 and commissioned 9 September 1961 under the command of then-Captain Eugene Parks Wilkinson, who previously served as the first commanding officer of the world's first nuclear-powered vessel, the submarine USS Nautilus (SSN-571).

She deployed to Vietnam during the Vietnam War and served numerous times in the Western Pacific, Indian Ocean and Persian Gulf. By the 1990s, nuclear power was deemed too expensive to use on surface ships smaller than an aircraft carrier in view of defense budget cutbacks after the end of the Cold War.

Long Beach was decommissioned on 1 May 1995 instead of receiving her third nuclear refueling and proposed upgrade. After removal of the nuclear fuel, superstructure, and sections of the bow and stern, the hull segment containing the reactor and machinery spaces remains moored at Puget Sound Naval Shipyard.

Class and type: Long Beach-class cruiser
Displacement: 15,540 tons
Length: 721 ft 3 in (219.84 m)
Beam: 71 ft 6 in (21.79 m)
Draft: 30 ft 7 in (9.32 m)
Propulsion: 2 C1W nuclear reactors; 2 General Electric turbines; 80,000 shp (60 MW); 2 propellers
Speed: 30 knots (56 km/h)
Range: Unlimited (nuclear)
Complement: 1160 officers and men

source: File:USS Enterprise (CVAN-65), USS Long Beach (CGN-9) and USS Bainbridge (DLGN-25) underway in the Mediterranean Sea during Operation Sea Orbit, in 1964.jpg - Wikimedia Commons

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#1239 isnt this baby, and I think we did this one years ago in this thread: Big Muskie, biggest moveable drag-line crane ever built.

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source: https://www.caterpillar.com/en/news/caterpillarNews/history/the-story-of-big-muskie.html

In 1966, an exciting project started at the factories of the Bucyrus Erie Co. – the engineering and building of the components of what would be one of the world’s largest earthmoving machines ever built, “Big Muskie.” Central Ohio Coal Co. had chosen this immense machine because the mine property extended over 110,000 acres of hilly terrain and made the use of a dragline versus a shovel to be more profitable at the levels of earth the coal was located in. It also allowed the coal company to better carryout their reclamation plans.

The machine was so large it was necessary to ship the components to the coal mining customer in Ohio and erect the machine on site. It took 340 rail cars and 260 trucks to ship all of the components and 200,000 man hours to construct, but the machine finally went into production in 1969.

Weighing in at over 27,000,000 pounds, it stood nearly 22 stories high and had a 330-foot twin boom and a 220-cubic yard bucket the size of a 12-car garage.

In 1976, “Big Muskie” removed 8,000 yards of overburden for the coal company per operating hour. In its 22 years of service, it removed twice the amount of earth moved during the original construction of the Panama Canal.

Shut down in 1991, “Big Muskie” was finally dismantled for scrap in 1999.

The only component saved was the bucket, which was later incorporated into a display about the machine and surface mining and reclamation in Miners Memorial Park in McConnelsville, Ohio.
 
USS Oklahoma (BB-37), undergoing the parbuckle (righting) process, eight months after being capsized during the Pearl Harbor attack.
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A Doctor/Surgeon friend of mine, who was from the State of Oklahoma, had the American Flag that had flown on Oklahoma in his living room. Covered in water stains, I never learned how he got it. He's dead now so I'll never know.
 
USS Wisconsin firing her 16 inch forward guns at an Iraqi artillery position near the Kuwait-Saudi border and would be some of the first shots of the ground war, Desert Storm, 24th February 1991
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USS Biloxi (CL-80) underway during her shakedown cruise, October 1943. She is painted in Measure 21 camouflage
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any heavy metal "fans" who have set foot in, better yet worked at, a stamping plant (vehicle sized parts) would marvel at the presses. the sounds, the vibrations with the hits, the things flat pieces of metal can be turned into, the skill of tool & die people.

interesting vid .. about 10 mins, first five minutes are guys talking (interesting), second five is building (not narrated so you kinda gotta know what you're looking at) this behemoth, from ground prep for foundation to finally building a building around it. It? produces whole side of a vehicle body on a single press line.



only thing cooler to me? foundries. marvelous places.

:)
 
Soviet 406 mm/L50 battleship cannon on single mount for trials; many humans for scale; Kramatorsk, 1939
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USS Massachusetts (BB-59) is moved below the Charles M. Braga Jr. Memorial Bridge at Fall River, circa 1965
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