I have posted this enquiry before and got very little response but, as there are possibly more people have joined SN since then there just may be someone remembers this experiment, (apart from me!!).
I can't recall whether it was "Atlantic Causeway" or "Conveyor" was the ship involved, nor does it really matter!
Some retired R.A.F. boffin came-up with the following idea and, unfortunately, I left "The Merch" before the experiment had been run any great length of time so never knew if this blokes idea WAS of any commercial use.
He postulated that if air-bubbles were pumped round the hull of a ship it would greatly reduce the friction between hull and sea by allowing the ship to "slide" through this mass of bubbles.
He had put-up a huge amount of money himself to "back" the idea and Cunard agreed to let him try his idea out on one of the two ACL ships they owned.
A big f**k-off Howden screw air-compressor was mounted in the fo'csle, which pumped air into a massive, perforated canvas-belt runnig from port to starboard under the ship, (just abaft the bow-thruster), which had been rivetted to the hull.
Once the ship had dropped the pilot and before the stand-by turbo-alternator had been shut-down (Remember them? 12,500 r.p.m.! Who COULD forget?), the Howden was fired-up, both ammeters on the turbo's would go "full-scale", sphincters would be twitching until they'd "dropped-back" (the AMMETERS!!!!!), and, once the Howden was pumping air into the belt the stand-by alternator would be shut-down and, apart from a low "moaning" from the Howden you never knew it was there.
Does anyone remember this and, if they do, do they know if the air-belt "technology" DID make any difference to oil-consumption or was it still around 65 tons per watch? Salaams, Phil(Hippy)
I can't recall whether it was "Atlantic Causeway" or "Conveyor" was the ship involved, nor does it really matter!
Some retired R.A.F. boffin came-up with the following idea and, unfortunately, I left "The Merch" before the experiment had been run any great length of time so never knew if this blokes idea WAS of any commercial use.
He postulated that if air-bubbles were pumped round the hull of a ship it would greatly reduce the friction between hull and sea by allowing the ship to "slide" through this mass of bubbles.
He had put-up a huge amount of money himself to "back" the idea and Cunard agreed to let him try his idea out on one of the two ACL ships they owned.
A big f**k-off Howden screw air-compressor was mounted in the fo'csle, which pumped air into a massive, perforated canvas-belt runnig from port to starboard under the ship, (just abaft the bow-thruster), which had been rivetted to the hull.
Once the ship had dropped the pilot and before the stand-by turbo-alternator had been shut-down (Remember them? 12,500 r.p.m.! Who COULD forget?), the Howden was fired-up, both ammeters on the turbo's would go "full-scale", sphincters would be twitching until they'd "dropped-back" (the AMMETERS!!!!!), and, once the Howden was pumping air into the belt the stand-by alternator would be shut-down and, apart from a low "moaning" from the Howden you never knew it was there.
Does anyone remember this and, if they do, do they know if the air-belt "technology" DID make any difference to oil-consumption or was it still around 65 tons per watch? Salaams, Phil(Hippy)