[david smith]

The third and last Crown Prince built in 1979 at Swan Hunters, 1599tg. In 1983 she became Manchester Crown, and in 1985 sold and renamed Thai Amber. She was beaten to the role of last Prince Line ship by her sistership Royal Prince. They were both on the the combined Zim West Med service London-valencia-Malta-Piraeus-Limassol-Ashdod-Haifa-Cadiz-London (Crown Prince Jan 1981). A typical Manchester Liners trip was Manchester-Piraeus-Larnaca-Beirut-Latakia-Iskenderun-Piraeus-Naples-Manchester-Liverpool (Royal Prince Sept 1980)

Also pictured is the view from the port bridge wing on the Crown Prince

[aadje]

David / Aad

Pleased to see these pictures. Time indeed flies.

b/regards
aadje

[kev]

wow. Fond memories. I did one trip on the Crown Prince as a Cadet. Probably around 1981. Great to see the photo's, particularly the shot from the bridge wing.

Good times.

Kev

[Bunkerbarge]

I can't believe the Crown was built in '79. I still think of it as a new ship!!

I must have sailed on her in the mid eighties when she was doing Ellesmere Port, Opporto, and Gibraltar. She was renamed 'City of Opporto' at the time as she was doing an "Ellerman City Line" run. I lived in Northwich and was getting my 200 cigarettes and a bottle off every 10 days.

Along with the Royal Prince and I thought one or two others built at the same time and to the same design, they were fitted with the last production Doxford engines made.

They were a medium speed three cylinder configuration and were quite mesmerising to watch. The crank case was a piece of art. It took about 10 minutes to remove both pistons in a cylinder but about two hours and a lot of bruises to change a dam injector! As the rings wore and the compression dropped off you had to pour cylinder oil down the top piston to seal the rings and ensure that she started each time. Many a happy stand by's leaping around the tops with a bucket of oil in my hand.

I really enjoyed my time on this ship, great atmosphere, small friendly crew and a nice little engine room.

[andrewhclark]

I sailed on both Crown Prince and Royal Prince as 2/0. I joined both in the yard for the maiden voyages and spent many happy trips on them both. They were some of the first ships to sail with out R/O and use the telex as the main means of communication. In the beginning we did not always get a friendly response from Portishead Radio. How things have changed? The runs to the Medy were excellent we even did one trip to Montreal, for Manchester Liners!

[saltyswamp]

Thought you might like this Link I was there
Stuart
http://www.shipsnostalgia.com/galler...-crown/cat/all

[ixion]

The Crown Prince was laid up in the River Blackwater in Essex for some time in about 1979 . Does anyone have any dates or memories of that ?

See http://www.merseamuseum.org.uk/mmshipping.php