1931 footage of the Empire State building

[racer-john]

The opening was a year before I was born hah hah, I'm still here. Lol.

[camdigger]

Originally Posted by unfinished

What are they heating the rivets with? is it like an induction heater? I know nothing about skyrise construction.

Most likely a coal or coke forge..... At 14:30 in the vid, you can see the smith cranking the forge heating the rivet, and tossing it to the catcher 's bucket who then hands it off to the installation crew. You can also see the smoke rolling off the forge and the pile of solid fuel around the fire.

[toprecycler]

Amazing that it only took like a year and half to build. I can’t imagine how long something like that would take today. At least a couple years of engineering to start with.


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[tigman250]

While vacationing on the Keeweenaw Peninsula several years back we toured the Quincy mine, always fascinates me to see how things got done years ago. lots of brute strength and hand tools, people from that era were tough and resilient, can you imagine what one would say if you expected them to work that hard nowadays?

[digger doug]

Originally Posted by slip knot

I read somewhere that the death toll could be calculated by how much money the project cost back then. something like one death per Million dollars was the norm for the time.

Yes, Joe Michaels over at PM did a nice write up on one job, IIRC the powder river basin power plant, and he mentioned that calculation, albeit with
more details.

[Matt Shade]

Originally Posted by digr

All those weights on the hook must of been for wind moving the hook maybe?????

Complete guess on my part, but machinery was a lot less sophisticated back then and I was thinking the extra weight might have smoothed out the control a little bit. Particularly when spooling out cable for the next lift.

Thanks for sharing the video.

[CaddmannQ]

Riveters and hod men packed their ears to avoid deafness. All people weren't stupid then just because there was no OSHA.

Sometimes multiple connection plates are supplied just because of the joint design. Sometimes because you must punch a 1" hole in a 2" plate and you just can't do it. It's easy to just punch and stack 1" plates, and it can work just fine. There are sometimes extra considerations, but they won't normally be influential.

Back then you didn't have to hire just anybody to fill quotas or avoid legal beagles hounding you. You wouldn't put guys on a beam who couldn't swing with it. You chose the best men you could get, and on a project like that you could get the best.