at this one. Production from this plant amounted to approximately three
         hundred and fifty yards per eight-hour shift.
         
              The first concrete mixer, which the regiment obtained, was of British
         make and had a capacity of seven cubic feet. A one-cylinder gas engine
         provided the power. This machine broke down frequently and it was a good
         day when it produced fifteen yards of concrete. At a later date fourteen
         cubic feet mixers were obtained and with these a better production of
         concrete was maintained. One of the most efficient mixers, which the
         regiment had, was a fourteen cubic foot mixer which was mounted on
         pneumatic tires and was powered by a Mercury V-8 engine obtained from an
         obsolete Bren gun carrier.
         
              French equipment of all ages and descriptions was used during these
         early months. The road crew had two French steam rollers, the sheet metal
         shop had some French sheet metal equipment, a French tractor was used to
         pull a trailer on the hospital job and other French equipment was used to
         heat asphalt. The bin from an ore car used at the nickel plant in Noumea
         was mounted on a sixteen ton trailer to provide the regiment with an eight
         yard dump trailer at a time when it was necessary to haul a large quantity of
         aggregate from Dumbea to Noumea.
         
              Other expedients included a pneumatic roller made by shortening a
         trailer body and mounting thereon a bin for stone to provide the necessary
         weight; home made hammer handles; home made trowels for finishing
         concrete; an improved batching plant for concrete mixing; jigs for the small
         electric bench saw and the pneumatic circular saws so that they could be
         used as cutoff saws; and other smaller devices too numerous to mention.
         
              As the lack of proper equipment hampered the progress of
         construction so did the lack of building materials. The scarcity of clean,
         well-graded aggregate for concrete was mentioned earlier. This was
         naturally a tremendous hindrance to both production and handling. In the
         available aggregate there were pieces of gravel up to 4” in diameter and at
         times it was quite dirty. It needs no explanation to show that aggregate
         such as this was a very definite obstacle to both good workmanship and
         good progress. Lumber generally was available but at times there were
         shortages both in quantity and required sizes. This last made necessary the
         resawing of certain sizes. The resawing was accomplished with the
         pneumatic saws. Plumbing supplies were not available and this retarded the
         completion of the first hospital and made it impossible to maintain any sort
         of schedule. Electrical supplies were not available in any quantity during the
         first months that the regiment was on the island, but construction was not
         slowed greatly for this reason. Some native type buildings were constructed