Anyone Interested in Ships

[J. S. Bach]

2 hours ago, big jim said:

Ooh, that thing is ugly! On second thought, I do not which is uglier; the ship or the buildings to the left of it.

[MarkC]

On 02/07/2022 at 00:29, J. S. Bach said:

Ooh, that thing is ugly! On second thought, I do not which is uglier; the ship or the buildings to the left of it.

It is - but it's a rank amateur fugly, compared to some of the floating block of flats behemoths that are around these days...

[Johann Marsbar]

A couple from Douglas in the past week....

 

 

[johnofwessex]

1 hour ago, Johann Marsbar said:

A couple from Douglas in the past week....

 

 

 

Why is it still called 'The Steam Packet' when it hasnt been steam for about 40 years?

[6990WitherslackHall]

Here's two Royal Navy ships that were anchored off at Scarborough on Armed Forces Day. 

 

The one of the left is the HMS Westminster. The one one the right is RFA Tiderace, an RFA Tide class tanker.

 

RFA (Royal Fleet Auxiliary) Tiderace is one of a class of just four Tide class tankers. They came into service from 2017-2018. The other Tide class tankers are RFA Tidespring, RFA Tidesurge and RFA Tideforce.

 

Edited July 5, 2022 by 6990WitherslackHall
More info added

[Tankerman]

30 minutes ago, 6990WitherslackHall said:

Here's two Royal Navy ships that were docked at Scarborough on Armed Forces Day. 

 

The one of the left is the HMS Westminster. The one one the right is a RFA (Royal Fleet Auxiliary) Tide class tanker.

 

The Tide class tankers came into service from 2017-2018. It's only a small class of four: RFA Tidespring, RFA Tiderace, RFA Tidesurge and RFA Tideforce.

 

So the Tide class in the picture could be any one of those four.

 

 

The previous Tiderace was known as the Tid-era-rache by at least some of her crew. This was a play on how Liberace, a well known piano player in the 1950/60, pronounced his name.

[St Enodoc]

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-07-05/ship-portland-bay-to-spend-another-night-stranded-off-sydney/101211272

 

Not sure about the turbo blower being used to cool the engine but why let facts get in the way of the story?

 

What might happen regarding salvage?

[drmditch]

1 hour ago, 6990WitherslackHall said:

Here's two Royal Navy ships that were docked at Scarborough on Armed Forces Day. 

 

The one of the left is the HMS Westminster. The one one the right is a RFA (Royal Fleet Auxiliary) Tide class tanker.

 

T

 

Is it pedantic to point out that neither of these vessels could get into Scarborough harbour?

I would say 'anchored off', but would be 'moored off' be acceptable?

 

(I thought 'moored' meant secured to some permanent feature like a quay or a fixed mooring buoy.)

 

Thank you for the nice picture anyway.

Edited July 5, 2022 by drmditch

[Bon Accord]

1 hour ago, johnofwessex said:

 

Why is it still called 'The Steam Packet' when it hasnt been steam for about 40 years?

 

For much the same reason as ASLEF still stands for "Associated Society of Locomotive Engineers and Firemen", it's just a name, albeit a historical one.

P&O's official name is still the "Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company", or at least what's left of it is after Lord Sterling and his cronies progressively destroyed that great company from the '80s onwards.

[6990WitherslackHall]

35 minutes ago, drmditch said:

Is it pedantic to point out that neither of these vessels could get into Scarborough harbour?

I would say 'anchored off', but would be 'moored off' be acceptable?

 

(I thought 'moored' meant secured to some permanent feature like a quay or a fixed mooring buoy.)

Changed it 🙂

[6990WitherslackHall]

2 hours ago, johnofwessex said:

Why is it still called 'The Steam Packet' when it hasn't been steam for about 40 years?

Cos they couldn't be bothered to change the name probably 

Edited July 5, 2022 by 6990WitherslackHall

[KeithMacdonald]

2 hours ago, Tankerman said:

The previous Tiderace was known as the Tid-era-rache by at least some of her crew. This was a play on how Liberace, a well known piano player in the 1950/60, pronounced his name.

 

Was Liberace one of the onboard entertainments crew?

[KeithMacdonald]

2 hours ago, drmditch said:

Is it pedantic to point out that neither of these vessels could get into Scarborough harbour?

 

Err, possibly. 

Some might say they could get into Scarborough harbour. But might not get out again.

 

HMS Campbeltown or Sub-Lieutenant Phillips?

Take your pick.

[MarkC]

3 hours ago, 6990WitherslackHall said:

Here's two Royal Navy ships that were moored at Scarborough on Armed Forces Day. 

 

The one of the left is the HMS Westminster. The one one the right is a RFA (Royal Fleet Auxiliary) Tide class tanker.

 

The Tide class tankers came into service from 2017-2018. It's only a small class of four: RFA Tidespring, RFA Tiderace, RFA Tidesurge and RFA Tideforce.

 

So the Tide class in the picture could be any one of those four.

 

It was RFA Tiderace

[6990WitherslackHall]

5 minutes ago, KeithMacdonald said:

Some might say they could get into Scarborough harbour. But might not get out again.

Probably staying on the safe side. If they went further in, they'd probably end up getting beached.

[MarkC]

2 hours ago, drmditch said:

 

Is it pedantic to point out that neither of these vessels could get into Scarborough harbour?

I would say 'anchored off', but would be 'moored off' be acceptable?

 

(I thought 'moored' meant secured to some permanent feature like a quay or a fixed mooring buoy.)

 

Thank you for the nice picture anyway.

"Anchored off" is the correct term to use here in this situation, for this war canoe & its support ship 😎

 

And yes, "moored" is when you're tied up to a jetty, dolphins, buoys etc...

[MarkC]

17 minutes ago, KeithMacdonald said:

 

Err, possibly. 

Some might say they could get into Scarborough harbour. But might not get out again.

 

HMS Campbeltown or Sub-Lieutenant Phillips?

Take your pick.

There's no way that either of those ships would get anywhere near the harbour entrance, never mind enter the port, even at High Water on a spring tide. Even the pleasure steamers (yes, that phrase is still used, despite them being motor ships for many years) occasionally come to grief there. I saw one such incident, maybe only 6 or 7 years ago. The skipper got the turn wrong, came out of the channel & ended up on the putty, on a falling tide. The RNLI had to go out & get the passengers off.

[Tankerman]

On 05/07/2022 at 13:32, KeithMacdonald said:

 

Was Liberace one of the onboard entertainments crew?

 

It's a fascinating thought, but one which had he done so, would have probably have caused a breach of the 'good order and discipline' rule. 🙂

[MarkC]

Well now, an interesting (as in the Chinese curse "May you live in interesting times") event happened during our last passage - just after midnight (why does nothing like this ever happen at civilised times?) a couple of days ago I heard the main engine speeding up, followed almost immediately by the lights going out. (We were running on the Shaft Generator at the time). The standby genset came on correctly after a few moments, restoring electrical power. I discovered that, whilst the main engine was still running, the clutch which engages the propeller shaft with the gearbox had opened. Obviously, whilst the engine governor had reacted promptly, taking 85% of load demand off the engine instantaneously did allow the engine to accelerate to the point where the shaft generator high frequency protection kicked in & tripped the machine off line, hence the blackout. There were also unusual noises coming from the gearbox mounted LO pump, which normally circulates the oil whilst the gearbox is in operation.

 

I also noticed that the electric standby gearbox pump was running; on stopping it, LO pressure dropped to zero, so I restarted it & after checking with the bridge that it was safe to do so, we stopped the engine. Obviously the clutch had opened when the LO pressure fell - the question was, why?

 

After doing the obvious checks, the conclusion was that there was something seriously amiss with the gearbox mounted LO pump. On restarting, the noises from the pump had stopped, but it still wasn't producing any pressure. It was decided to proceed to our destination using the standby pump.

 

On arrival, we opened up the pump, to be greeted by this - a broken gearwheel

 

And the driving shaft - sheared when the pump seized

 

and a crack on the driving spline, almost certainly caused by the shock of the pump initially seizing when the gear wheel broke

 

3 points of failure - the forces involved will have been huge. Fortunately no further mechanical damage was found, but the damage to our budget - getting a new pump, plus transport from Denmark to Rotterdam in a hurry - well, that's a different story...

 

Why did the gear fail? We have no idea - we had been running for some 30 hours since leaving the previous port when it happened, & the pump itself had only run some 15,000 hours since installation in 2018. Makers' inspection/overhaul interval is 30,000 hours/5 years, so it was well within both limits, & as it pumps LO it's not an aggressive medium. The filter fitted before it was in good condition too, so that rules out a foreign object entering the pump & causing the failure.

 

The good news is that the new pump arrives today, & we are scheduled to complete cargo operations & sail tomorrow afternoon, so we're not delaying the ship.  That would have been even more expensive...

 

Never a dull moment at sea 😜

Edited July 8, 2022 by MarkC

[St Enodoc]

34 minutes ago, MarkC said:

Well now, an interesting (as in the Chinese curse "May you live in interesting times") event happened during our last passage - just after midnight (why does nothing like this ever happen at civilised times?) a couple of days ago I heard the main engine speeding up, followed almost immediately by the lights going out. (We were running on the Shaft Generator at the time). The standby genset came on correctly after a few moments, restoring electrical power. I discovered that, whilst the main engine was still running, the clutch which engages the propeller shaft with the gearbox had opened. Obviously, whilst the engine governor had reacted promptly, taking 85% of load demand off the engine instantaneously did allow the engine to accelerate to the point where the shaft generator high frequency protection kicked in & tripped the machine off line, hence the blackout. There were also unusual noises coming from the gearbox mounted LO pump, which normally circulates the oil whilst the gearbox is in operation.

 

I also noticed that the electric standby gearbox pump was running; on stopping it, LO pressure dropped to zero, so I restarted it & after checking with the bridge that it was safe to do so, we stopped the engine. Obviously the clutch had opened when the LO pressure fell - the question was, why?

 

After doing the obvious checks, the conclusion was that there was something seriously amiss with the gearbox mounted LO pump. On restarting, the noises from the pump had stopped, but it still wasn't producing any pressure. It was decided to proceed to our destination using the standby pump.

 

On arrival, we opened up the pump, to be greeted by this - a broken gearwheel

 

And the driving shaft - sheared when the pump seized

 

and a crack on the driving spline, almost certainly caused by the shock of the pump initially seizing when the gear wheel broke

 

3 points of failure - the forces involved will have been huge. Fortunately no further mechanical damage was found, but the damage to our budget - getting a new pump, plus transport from Denmark to Rotterdam in a hurry - well, that's a different story...

 

Why did the gear fail? We have no idea - we had been running for some 30 hours since leaving the previous port when it happened, & the pump itself had only run some 15,000 hours since installation in 2018. Makers' inspection/overhaul interval is 30,000 hours/5 years, so it was well within both limits, & as it pumps LO it's not an aggressive medium. The filter fitted before it was in good condition too, so that rules out a foreign object entering the pump & causing the failure.

 

The good news is that the new pump arrives today, & we are scheduled to complete cargo operations & sail tomorrow afternoon, so we're not delaying the ship.  That would have been even more expensive...

 

Never a dull moment at sea 😜

It's those bl00dy Hornby gears again.

[SHMD]

I've used pumps like that, but not to pump oil it was to pump vacuum - ok pumping air out to create a vacuum.

I always called them "Roots Blowers". Same principle of operation but with far few teeth on each gear.

 

Strangely enough, I had a 22kW driven pump fail on me in Taiwan, many years ago, because it was installed without the fitter adding the required oil on each side!

 

 

Kev.

 

[MarkC]

21 minutes ago, St Enodoc said:

It's those bl00dy Hornby gears again.

At least it's not mazak rot...

[MarkC]

10 minutes ago, SHMD said:

I've used pumps like that, but not to pump oil it was to pump vacuum - ok pumping air out to create a vacuum.

I always called them "Roots Blowers". Same principle of operation but with far few teeth on each gear.

 

Strangely enough, I had a 22kW driven pump fail on me in Taiwan, many years ago, because it was installed without the fitter adding the required oil on each side!

 

 

Kev.

 

Oops!

 

Rootes blowers - I sailed on a ship with Detroit Diesels gensets - 'orrible things, we referred to them as Destroyed Diesels. 1800 rpm V-8 2-strokes. They had both Rootes blowers and turbochargers.

 

Mind you, for scary vacuum pumps, try a Sundyne blower. Found on some ethylene carriers & shore installations many years ago...

[SHMD]

I've never used a "Sundyne Blower" on a vacuum system - or even heard of them!

I guess it was cooled other than from the medium it was pumping!  :)

 

 

Kev.

 

[MarkC]

13 minutes ago, SHMD said:

I've never used a "Sundyne Blower" on a vacuum system - or even heard of them!

I guess it was cooled other than from the medium it was pumping!  :)

 

 

Kev.

 

Ethylene vapour in containment systems is usually at about -100 Deg.C, +/- a couple of degrees. That's pretty cold...

 

Sundyne blower? It's basically a large, noisy beast with large bits whizzing around inside at very high speeds with very small gaps between static & moving components, that draws a lot of power, is very good at what it does, but, if it goes wrong, it usually does so in a spectacular fashion... 😱