Included in the above were two large gas-operated furnaces and a mill which could produce plates from ⅛ to 6 inch thickness and 27 feet wide. Roach's milling machines incorporated both vertical and horizontal rollers which allowed plates to be finished with parallel edges, eliminating the necessity of shearing ragged edges to size. Some of the new machinery was capable of rolling steel as well as iron ingots. Power to operate the milling machines was provided by four large Corliss steam engines and eight smaller ones. A five-ton steam hammer was also installed. After the expansion, the mill could produce 300 tons of steel plate a day in addition to the 300 tons of iron plate and 700 tons of pig iron already produced. The mill as a whole consumed 1,400 tons of iron ore, 600 tons of limestone and 1,000 tons of coal per week. The workforce was also expanded to 500 people, with a weekly payroll of $6,000. A notable achievement for the company following the addition of the steel milling facilities was the production of steel plates for America's first steel-hulled ship, the cargo ship Alaskan, built by the Roach shipyard for the Oregon Railway and Navigation Company and delivered in August 1883. ABCD ships and Roach receivership On July 2, 1883, John Roach & Sons won the contracts for all four of the Navy's first steel ships—, , , and —or the "ABCD ships", as they came to be known. The only bidder with his own steel mill, Roach was able to undercut the other bidders by a total of $270,000 on the price of steel alone. The final contracts were signed on July 23 and Roach began construction of the ships shortly thereafter. Roach was initially confident that he would have no difficulty supplying the steel for the four ships. To ensure the minimum of delay, he subcontracted with several other steel manufacturers, including the Norway Iron and Steel Company of South Boston, the Park Brothers' Black Diamond Works of Pittsburgh, and the Phoenix Iron Company of Phoenixville, Pennsylvania, for the supply of various steel parts. So exacting were the specifications however, that a third of all the parts produced were rejected by Navy inspectors, leading to cost overruns which eventually persuaded the subcontractors to renege on their agreements with Roach. Roach was left having to manufacture all the steel parts himself, although the situation