Anyone Interested in Ships

[St Enodoc]

1 hour ago, johnofwessex said:

A passengers report of what happened on MS Maud

 

https://eastangliabylines.co.uk/exclusive-bylines-editor-in-north-sea-emergency/

 

 

"The captain cancelled the stops of Loen & Stavanger in hope of beating the storm and getting back to Tilbury"

 

Hmm...

[The Johnster]

Sounds absolutely terrifying, but the crew seem to have held her together and coped as well as they could.  There are lessons to be learned, all the same; the writing down of cabin numbers on sickbags or backs of hand sounds like something that could have led to trouble if things had got worse, and the sheer amount of debris crashing about could have been reduced with a bit of pre-storm clearing away, though how much time was realistically available for this I don't know.  A gingerbread village is definitely surplus to requirements in this sort of situation, though.

[New Haven Neil]

On a farcebook shipping page today - the Stirling Bridge, my first ship.  120,000 ton dwt, Sulzer 9RND90 (JJB knows how much I like those) not a bad ship at all - that looks like a ship unlike those self-loading cargo jobs.

 

[jjb1970]

Proper ship👍

 

Most of the slow speed engines I sailed with were Sulzer, RND then RTA. Subzero had a reputation for doing things differently,  there was the (in)famous fuel pump design which was bombproof in my experience  (I never had one fail) and gave far more control over injection than the jerk pumps used by everyone else. And the rotating piston of the Z/ZA40 engine.

 

The worst slow speed engines I encountered were MAN. Not the modern ones, the true MAN slow speeds. MAN bought B&W and scrapped their own slow speed designs so more modern MAN slow speed engines are evolved from B&W designs (which is good). The MAN KSZ was hideous, in P&OCL they were known as Hitler's revenge. In fairness the rest of the ships weren't much better. In the mid 70's to early 80's the company built a few twin screw ships in Germany the memory of which permanently altered my opinion of German engineering.

[SHMD]

" In the mid 70's to early 80's the company built a few twin screw ships in Germany the memory of which permanently altered my opinion of German engineering."

 

How so?

 

 

Kev.

 

[SteveyDee68]

On 24/12/2023 at 22:23, St Enodoc said:

"The captain cancelled the stops of Loen & Stavanger in hope of beating the storm and getting back to Tilbury"

 

Hmm...

I’m no experience of being aboard a ship other than as a passenger (usually cross channel ferries, although back in 1986 as a 17 year old I did travel through a Force 10 storm on the way from Newcastle to Denmark* which reduced half the crew and laid most passengers low with sea sickness, but which I simply found exhilarating!) but I read that and simply wonder why they don’t put into safe port and wait whilst the worst of the storm has passed?

 

I am sure that is a very naive position as I’m not thinking about future schedules etc but surely that’s cheaper than repairing damage to a ship and possibly having to pay out compensation to unhappy passengers?

 

Steve S

 

* Can’t remember where we actually sailed to - there was a disembarkation (and that’s fun with 90 kids, luggage and musical instruments!) and a long railway journey (including a train ferry if I remember right) before reaching Copenhagen Central Station!

[SHMD]

"Esbjerg" could fit the itinerary.

 

 

Kev.

 

[AHW]

You may be interested in this item which I found in a house clearance shop some years ago. There are several copies for sale on the web - London's Lost Riverscape - rather like a streetmap from the river taken in 1937. A very good source for the late Iain Rice's LDEs (layout design elements) if you wanted to model a river frontage/dockside although sourcing a ship model for 00 gauge seems to be hard work.

 

What makes the book most interesting is that the authors have traced the working lives of the ships seen moored at the riverside - many of them lost to enemy action in the coming war.

Edited December 26, 2023 by AHW

[Deeps]

1 minute ago, AHW said:

…..if you wanted to model a river frontage/dockside although sourcing a ship model for 00 gauge seems to be hard work.

My layout plans include at least 2 such features, possibly 3, and I agree that suitable models are hard to find. I have a kit for the old Revell Flower Class Corvette, which the largest model I could accommodate, and a couple of Airfix MTB/Rescue Launches.

 

It would be possible to scratch build more appropriate models and there are kits available but they are relatively costly and would take some time to complete, which would divert my efforts from modelling the railway.

 

I have acquired a well worn HMS Bounty (Airfix I think) which is roughly the correct scale and plan to modify it to represent a typical sailing vessel of the 1920’s/30’s, but what I really want is an RNLI boat from the same period. I am surprised that none of the plastic kit manufacturers appear to produce such a model, bearing in mind the public admiration for the work done by the RNLI.

[jjb1970]

10 hours ago, SHMD said:

" In the mid 70's to early 80's the company built a few twin screw ships in Germany the memory of which permanently altered my opinion of German engineering."

 

How so?

 

 

Kev.

 

 

Crikey, where to start. The ships had a host of problems from large to small, which were litigated for many years.

 

The worst issue was probably an engine/shaft alignment issue which led to heavy vibration and having to retension the main engine holding down bolts every two months and replace a fair few on each engine. That is almost unheard of (usually the holding down bolt tension is checked once in a blue moon and to find a broken bolt is like rocking horse droppings). The situation went on for years and years and in the end it was easier to just have the engineers onboard try and keep on top of the problem and accept a financial settlement rather than doing a proper remedial adjustment of the engines.

 

The next biggest issue was probably main engine turbo surging which indicates something fundamentally wrong with the pressure charging arrangement and a design error in matching the turbo and engine. Which is unlikely given they were standard engines and other MAN engines of the same type operated normally. The engine builders spent years trying to identify the fault but never did. Usually surging is an unusual occurrence, and tends to be associated with unusual engine operation. For the things to surge regularly at stable load in a calm sea is not normal.

 

Then there was chronic unreliability of MaK auxiliary engines. The engines were MaK 453 engines which were an excellent (if older and rather primitive) engine when operated on diesel. MaK realising the way the market was going adapted them to run on IFO180 fuel and they just weren't up to it. Valves burnt out, heads failed, they struggled to reach maximum load etc. The engineers at MaK claimed they weren't designed to run on IFO. Quite true and while I had sympathy for the MaK engineers their employer had marketed and sold the engines as being operable on IFO, therefore they should have been able to do so. MaK riding squads to keep on top of them were a part of life.

 

Looking at smaller issues, the cylinder oil was in an unheated double bottom tank, meaning it took forever to top up the header tanks in colder weather, we had a pair of binoculars in the control room so we could start the transfer pump and then keep an eye of the header tank gauges from the control room as it took all morning to top up. An annoyance which was unnecessary. The fuel and ballast tanks were in a duct keel with hydraulic actuators with no manual hand wheel so if the actuator failed (which they did) it meant lugging a hydraulic hand pump up the duct keel and then crawling over pipes into side compartments to open or close valves, traipse back up the duct keel and then back again when fuel transfer was finished to revert the valve position. Then overhaul the valve actuator. Other ships had valve compartments at the bottom of the holds or positioned the valves in the ER, and had valves which could be opened/closed by hand is necessary.

 

It went on like that, the whole machinery arrangements were awful. Even the control system was a disaster, drawings bore little relation to the as built wiring installation. Some of the blame was with the class society as the ships were designed and built under survey to class rules, and the company accepted the things (though went to court over multiple issues) but ultimately the yards were the ones that designed and built floating disasters. Even something as simple as the rudder carriers, I never gave much thought to rudder carriers again in my career but those ships had huge issues with them. Bow thruster seals too. Heinous.

 

I thought it was sort of normal as I sailed on them as a cadet, though I sailed on more normal ships. Then I sailed on big new Japanese built ships which were delivered from the yard and just worked with no problems. I then spent time standing by during construction in Japan and it was like a different world, the quality criteria and attention to getting it right. 

 

I spent a lot of time in yards and engine works in China working in class and although Chinese yards and engine builders had issues of their own I never saw anything quite like those twin screw ships again. Thankfully.

 

 

[The Johnster]

I suspect the problem is the existence of 1/72 scale models.  And that ships, even small ones, in 1/76ths, are BIG.  And that ships that go quietly about their business and eschew showy raked bows, sexy guns, torpedo tubes, and grey paint, that carry things rather than trying to sink them, are less glamorous and don't sell kits as well as the warships or ocean liners, or are not that White Star 4-stacker, are harder to come by.  A typical ocean-going merchantman of the inter-war era, and post-war for a couple of decades, would be about 450' length (Liberties were 441 and 1/2), a 7-coach train of mk1s and the loco.  A typical coaster might be around 120', and even a 'Dutch Barge' around 80'.  The go-to model railway solution is the Clyde Puffer, but this is not really suitable for layouts purporting to represent areas other than SW Scotland and the lee of the Outer Hebrides; they were not designed for the open sea.  There were exceptions such as the Bristol Channel's (in)famous Snowflake, but she was often in trouble and need of assistance, not a suitable vessel for her work!

 

Scale Model Scenery or someone like them, brain's done a runner, do a range of card late 50s-early 60s looking coasters as well as more modern vessels.

 

Cargo handling cranes are big as well.  The railway modeller's standby is the old Airfix (now Dapol/Kitmaster) 'Dockside' crane plastic kit.  This thing isn't a cargo handling crane, it is a small dockyard crane, with about 5tons lifting capacity, for handling items such as small winches and capstans in a ship repair yard.  It would not last 5 minutes handling proper cargo; too small, not enough height to clear the side of a biggish ship from the quayside, and jib or luff reach insufficient to load cargo in the holds, and simply lacking the power to work heavy cargo at an economic speed (don't forget the owner wants his ship out at sea earning money asap, not in port costing money with wharfage, services, towing, pilotage, &c. 

 

There are no RTP model go-tos for this sort of crane for UK-based layouts (or the Empire). European and American cranes look radically different to a Stothbert Level Luffer.  Warehouse buildings are HUGE, often measured in hundreds of yards footprints. 

[Mol_PMB]

Agreed, my Manchester Ship Canal layout hasn't got room for anything bigger than a rowing boat - there's no way I have space for a scene like this! Which gives a good feel for the size of ships and warehouses when you notice the wagons on the quays:

Even a harbour tug is a fair size:

Mol

[St Enodoc]

10 hours ago, SteveyDee68 said:

I read that and simply wonder why they don’t put into safe port and wait whilst the worst of the storm has passed?

 

I am sure that is a very naive position as I’m not thinking about future schedules etc but surely that’s cheaper than repairing damage to a ship and possibly having to pay out compensation to unhappy passengers?

My "Hmm" was a summary of my feeling, based on several press reports thrown up by Google, that in this particular case commercial pressure might have trumped good seamanship.

[St Enodoc]

8 hours ago, Deeps said:

what I really want is an RNLI boat from the same period. I am surprised that none of the plastic kit manufacturers appear to produce such a model, bearing in mind the public admiration for the work done by the RNLI.

The RNLI itself used to sell various 4mm scale whitemetal kits of different boats, made for them by W&T IIRC. They pop up on eBay occasionally.

[St Enodoc]

2 hours ago, The Johnster said:

I suspect the problem is the existence of 1/72 scale models.  And that ships, even small ones, in 1/76ths, are BIG.

 

Scale Model Scenery or someone like them, brain's done a runner, do a range of card late 50s-early 60s looking coasters as well as more modern vessels.

Artitec do a range of ship kits in 1/87, 1/120, 1/160 and 1/220 scales, although they're not easy to get hold of (usual disclaimer).

 

https://www.artitecshop.com/en/ships/

 

I have the 1/87 Dutch coaster waiting to be built. It is 550mm long.

[SteveyDee68]

11 hours ago, AHW said:

You may be interested in this item which I found in a house clearance shop some years ago. There are several copies for sale on the web - London's Lost Riverscape - rather like a streetmap from the river taken in 1937. A very good source for the late Iain Rice's LDEs (layout design elements) if you wanted to model a river frontage/dockside although sourcing a ship model for 00 gauge seems to be hard work.

 

What makes the book most interesting is that the authors have traced the working lives of the ships seen moored at the riverside - many of them lost to enemy action in the coming war.

Thanks for the heads-up - just ordered myself a copy plus a similar volume called “London’s Riverscape: Lost and Found” (Panorama of the river from 1937 and today) to add to my library!

 

Mind you, the foreword to the second book is by Ken Livingstone MP so that might not be quite as up to date as the title might imply! 
 

Steve S

[jjb1970]

9 hours ago, St Enodoc said:

My "Hmm" was a summary of my feeling, based on several press reports thrown up by Google, that in this particular case commercial pressure might have trumped good seamanship.

 Maritime regulations are very clear on the authority of the Master/Captain, reality is that seafarers are under a lot of pressure from owners and charterers and it needs someone with a stiff spine to make a stand in many cases. 

 

I found it was much better done in electricity generation at sea. When I was senior authorized in electricity it was made very clear an essential part of my role was to have the cajones to say no and it was made very clear I was responsible for my decisions. The CEO of the company (a large multi-national, not a two bit operation) made time to come and tell us that as long as we stayed within the company safe system of work in the event of an incident the company would be on trial, if we deviated then their lawyers would be there to protect the company and we'd have to defend ourselves. As such it was on us to tell management and senior people where to go if they put us under pressure. Blunt but I appreciated the directness. I found when I was at sea there were quite a lot of people who would do the 'right thing' in terms of what they thought the company wanted and shipping companies would often allow it.

[AHW]

Reading some of the responses re layout items - you may be interested in this supplier. https://www.dapr3d.com/

 

Currently on the Christmas break and has turned off their product pages to save confusion I guess.

 

But if you dig around you can find these - I'm hoping to add the crane to my dockside once it takes shape...

[KeithMacdonald]

21 hours ago, AHW said:

sourcing a ship model for 00 gauge seems to be hard work.

 

I've got some of the ScaleScenes offerings, which includes a cargo ship.

https://scalescenes.com/dockscenes

I've only built a Clyde Puffer so far, for a small-dock project.

 

[KeithMacdonald]

20 hours ago, Deeps said:

the 1920’s/30’s, but what I really want is an RNLI boat from the same period.

 

ScaleScenes has recently added a Barnett Class lifeboat, which Wiki says operated from 1923 to 1987. Would that do?

[Flanged Wheel]

Talking of models of the Flower Class corvettes, I recently came across this beautiful example at the Otago Museum in Dunedin. This is a superb museum that has a room full of ship models (of the kind that @jjb1970 was recently lamenting the lack of). This model is a little large for an OO layout but I thought I would share it on the basis that it is a thing of beauty. I remember my excitement when I came across HMCS Sackville in the harbour at Halifax (for some reason, I was unaware of its existence and had to explain to my children why Daddy was quite so excited by the little warship that was sitting quietly on the water). I’m not planning a future in building model ships (although my grandfather had a beautiful collection) but one day I will build a Flower Class model as a personal tribute to the remarkable crews of those little ships.

 

Anyway, enough rambling… Here’s the picture!

 

[KeithMacdonald]

Here's a link to that ScaleScenes lifeboat

https://scalescenes.com/product/t040a-lifeboat/

[KeithMacdonald]

FWIW, their cargo ship is described as 1950s/60s

https://scalescenes.com/product/t030-cargo-ship/

[johnofwessex]

The S&DJR's SS Radstock is only about 120 foot long, and I did get a nice reply from Simon Kohler as to why, he wasn't going to produce a RC model of one and from memory Bridgewater Docks could only handle ships of up to 160 feet and stayed in business until the 1960's 

[Deeps]

43 minutes ago, KeithMacdonald said:

 

ScaleScenes has recently added a Barnett Class lifeboat, which Wiki says operated from 1923 to 1987. Would that do?

This is exactly the type of vessel I desire, thank you. The process of producing the vessel from a download is new to me but I will give it a go.

 

Also, thanks to Keith Macdonald for providing the link. There are a number of additional prints available that will be useful.