The Driller
In the early years a driller worked with a ratchet but this method took an unbearable length of time and was extremely boring. The steam punch was better. Later the authorities were to introduce machines of the "air" and "electric'' variety - all in the name of progress - to which the men quickly adapted.

The Riveter
Over the past 20 years or so ships have been fabricated in large welded blocks weighing in many cases hundreds of tons. These blocks or units are taken from the fabrication areas and erected on the building berth or in the dock. Up until the 1940/50s ships were built by a different method. This involved cutting, shaping or bending individual steel plates, bars or angles to the required shape and punching them with rivet holes. These parts were then taken piecemeal to the building berth where they were first bolted together and then riveted using steel rivets. Originally, riveting was carried out by a rivet squad comprising four or five men. These were a left and right handed riveter to literally hit the red hot rivet with a rivet hammer, a 'holder on' who held the rivet in place while it was riveted, a 'heater boy' whose job it was to heat the rivet to the appropriate temperature. Hand riveting would have been used but much of it would have been completed using pneumatic hand tools and larger hydraulic machines.
Hand Riveting
The rivets were heated to a 'red heat' over a hearth and placed in previously punched holes. The head was 'held up'with a hammer by one man while the riveter hammered the projecting end into the required 'point'. The hot metal fills the hole, cools down, contracts and draws the metal plates together.
Hydraulic Riveting
Hydraulic riveting machines had U shaped jaws, acting as 'holder-upper' while a hand ram fitted with a hemispherical die formed the point. Pressure applied by the ram squeezed the point into shape with a single movement.
Pneumatic Riveting
Pneumatic hammers were worked by compressed air, enabling the riveting team to work much faster.
The rivets were made from round steel bars, cut to the required length. A head was formed at one end, and the other end, when riveted up, was called a 'point'.

Riveting was a dirty and dangerous job. To earn a living riveters had to work in closely co-ordinated teams known as 'squads'. Each squad functioned as a fiercely independent unit whose earnings were directly related to their ability to work as a team.
Working conditions were brutal. No work no pay was the rule !….in all weathers ...in exposed and cramped working conditions...with variable pay rates and no security of employment. Riveters had no options but to work long and hard... as long as work was available.

Memories of Riveting

Memories from Bill Stephenson
The Rivet Squad
When I first started work at Readheads the ships were nearly all riveted.
Riveted seams, butts, frames and beams. The frames were joggled, as were the beams.
It may not be generally known but in the days of hand riveting it took 5 men to knock in a rivet. There was;-
The Heater
He was the man who heated the rivets until they were totally red hot, then, with tongs he would throw the hot rivet to;-
The Catcher
He would catch the rivet in his can and with tongs place the rivet in to the rivet hole. Then;-
The Holder-on
Would then baulk and back-up the rivet with a very heavy hammer. Then the;-
Riveters, one left-handed and one right-handed, would clench over the rivet with alternate strikes.

This was all done at speed so that the ‘clenching-over’ could be completed before the red-hot rivet cooled.
The riveting teams were wonderful workers, when you consider the number of ships that Readhead’s built, their achievements were excellent.

In the days of riveted ships the Caulkers job was to seal, by caulking, thousands of feet of plate butts and seams using a caulking tool. When welding was introduced into the shipyards this job changed and the Caulkers work was to do edge preparation of steel plates for welding, the fitting of watertight doors, hatches, windows and sidelights (portholes). They also did water and air pressure testing of ships tanks and checked for leaks by covering the joints with soapy water and looking for air bubbles.

The Burner used an oxy/acetylene cutting torch to cut the steel plates where the shape was complicated. When burning machines were developed they would operate them as well.

The Blacksmiths would make all of the ships ladders, rails and stanchions, chains and similar items.
Ernie Alexander was Foreman in the sixties, I think.

The lines of the ships frames were often transferred to a scrieve board and taken to the Frame Turners who would use it to bend the frames to the correct shape.