Late 19th to mid 20th century production methods
 

As someone with an engineering background i've always been curious about how products used to be manufacted since the beginning of the industrial revolution.

Does anybody know what the production of the Lugers at DWM looked like? (or guns in general at that time)
What tolerances could be reached with their machines?

All i know is that the invention of High Speed Steel led to whats called "Wettdrehen" in german (Competition turning)

Yes, there are some good sources out there. DWM and parent company Ludw. Loewe & Cie. made most of their own tooling and also supplied other manufacturers like FN in Belgium.

There are tooling brochures and a nice reference book from that era. Basically lathes, milling machines, drills combined with jigs and checked with go-no go gauges between steps.

Hand fitting and correction done when needed. Workers were paid per correct step, so were motivated to do a decent job. If their work had to be corrected, it came from their pay.

Moderne Gewehrfabrikation by Otto Maretsch in 1913 is a good starter.

I seem to recall that Ludwig Loewe came to the US to learn about the techniques involved in the production of interchangeable parts as developed by Eli Whitney.
Ron

Correct. Initially Loewe planned to mass produce sewing machines, but quickly learned guns sold better. They also laid the foundation for the German industrial norm, forerunner of DIN and ISO standards.

I've always hoped there were pictures of production plant, but have never seen any.

Speeds book shows Mauser pictures of production.

Some from 1913

Gerben, Thank you! Great photos.

Loewe.

They not only made and sold tooling, but also tools to maintain and refurbish the tooling.

DWM was also specialized in ammunition production equipment and could offer complete manufacturing sets for ammunition component production.

I was told by a shipyard machinist one time that the lathe is the only tool that could reproduce itself, with the help of man of course...

I notice the overhead jackshafts for pulley belts are absent in picture 40 of the FN Herstal production. I see electric light fixtures but cannot tell if there are any electric powered tools in place.

The last DWM photos do show equipment with electric motors.

Neat stuff

I think it's the Bridgeport mill!

The frame of all of them need to be cast.
Agree with Ithacaartist that the mill is more likely than the lathe. The lathe bed is flat.
But if the lathe turned the tool, and the work was stationary, voila! you have a mill

Gerben and Mauro's book on Mauser includes a number of photos of production including a very famous photo, reproduced in a number of places, of the batch final assembly of the C-96 pistol in the workshop at the top of the Schwedenbau in Oberndorf.

The high precision metal work involved with gun making was really one of the high water marks of the second industrial revolution that took place in the 1880's and into the early 20th century. Guns, sewing machines, motor vehicles, and other mechanical "wonders" required precision, new metal alloys and (in the case of firearms) some degree of hand fitting.

Some operations, like barrel straightening, were so precision and required such a skilled "touch" that they were always done by hand.

In addition to the "tooling" (both manual, pully belt system powered and later, electric powered), the "gauges" were equally important to production. These were precision test and measurement fixtures that were used to verify that the "finished" part was ready for the next process. Often, parts were reinspected by both factory and contract acceptance workers. You'll find production marks all over many firearms in unobtrusive places indicating who produced and inspected a given part. Contract acceptance is, of course, where the WaffenAmt stamps come from.

Gerben and Mauro also have examples of gauges and a complete set of government Waffenamt stamps is known.Those gauges could give us an idea of the precision required.

The Blueprints for Lugers show the rough precision that was needed for this product. But just like "spec" engines, high precision was always possible. I believe that in Lugers, this is shown by the work done by the Swiss in Bern. While the DWM and Mauser products were excellent, the Waffenfabrik Bern and SIG components that they used were like precision on steroids, particularly the M1929 design revision.

Ironically, the precision required to manufacture a Luger was part of it's undoing as a military contract firearm. This increased the unit cost, and even with labor and time saving changes like salt bluing (and any number of production step revisions) Mauser could not get the cost down below Fritz Walther's P.38.

Mauser C96 assembly.
Parts checking and pocket pistol assembly.