I sailed on a great many steam-turbine ships, many of them over 30 years old, and I could count the number of breakdowns on the fingers of one hand, with several left over. I also sailed on many diesel ships, for which I certainly cannot say the same. I have sailed on some diesel ships that literally couldn't make it through a single voyage without at least one major engine casualty.

Bottom line: a steam turbine essentially has one moving part. A diesel engine intrinsically is far more complicated. The more complicated something is, the greater the chances of it breaking down.

However, the other bottom line is that steam turbines are more expensive to make, and take up more space and weight. Furthermore, steam turbine plants are required to be manned by watch-standers 24 hours a day, while on most modern diesel ships the engine room is left unmanned at night. In other words, in the long run, the entire argument comes down to a question of money.

 

When you think about it, it doesn't make much sense to accelerate a lump of metal to a high speed and then reverse the action. Better surely to let it go windy, windy.

I know this will impress engineers as being insightful, but I am no great expert on this, despite my command of technical vocabulary. You may shoot me down in flames if you wish. (could I stop you).

 

Dagger,dagger,dagger. Not without an auxiliary Diesel engine(*))

 

Jim
i sailed on several of Brocks turbine steamers. Of them all, three had breakdowns. The first was Mawana when the thrust bearings on the tail shaft ran the white metal and so was not stream related. Makrana suffered a collapse of the brickwork in the FD4 boiler (singular). Mahseer suffered a lub oil contamination of the MP turbine, fixed in Durban after steaming at speed reduced to about 11 knots for about week or so. Turbine casing opened to reveal a light ginger biscuit coloured gunge. Quickly cleaned and off we went at an astronomical 13½ knots. Well she was then a mere 24 years old with the boiler pressure downgraded. The first two were the only ones to STOP at sea for any reason. That was not the case on the motor ships, whether it was Sultzer or Pielstik, so many and varied I lost count.

 

The few steam engine breakdowns that I have seen had to do with components other than the turbines themselves, usually things such as boilers, bearings or condensers. However, those problems seem usually to have been traceable to improper maintenance procedures. On one notable occasion at Callao, Peru, we had to shut down the boilers when the condenser intakes became clogged. We had to hire a diver to clear the intakes from the outside, and it turned out that the intakes were clogged up with jellyfish.

 

When it comes to at sea engine stops, I'm simply amazed nobody has mentioned D******s!
Steamers can go UMS, indeed I sailed on one as recently as 2003 which had an unmanned engine room.
I've sailed on a number of steamships in my time, mostly steam turbine but also one up and downer, and can't recall a single at sea breakdown.

 

Triple expansions, never had a breakdown that was engine related as they were 'over engineered', you would have to have been careless to break one, as in poor lubrication or leaving the drain valves closed on start up.
Steam Turbines, my steam turbine time was done in the R.N and as far as I remember we had no problems with the turbines.
With both systems the weakness was in the Boilers and some of the engine room equipment, this equipment was usually easy to repair as it was also 'over engineered'.
I would think that most Engineers who have sailed on steam would prefer steam to Diesel but if you wanted to stay at sea rather than come ashore and be a Turbine Op in a Power Station the (alternative being Tankers or Passenger vessels if you wanted to stay at sea) diesel beckoned.
I can understand when companies decided to advertise for 'Sandwich Cadets' they showed photographs of
young men stood at the controls of an S.T. rather than a diesel(EEK)
What can be said about diesels that has not already been said, unfortunately the enforced change of fuel (for most anyway) led to increased problems.
For my own preference it has to be steam with a nuclear steam source and the ever reliable V.T.E(Jester)
Klaatu, the old fashioned 'blow jacks' fitted to your intake(s) would have sorted your problem out!!

 

I've sailed as engineer on both steam and diesel. Diesel easily wins on economy, and suitable staff are easily found to operate it. Steam is more sophisticated and requires extra care and attention.
Breakdowns on diesel are less of a problem now than in the past (think Doxford nightmares), and we did once have to chip out a complete row of blades from and LP rotor on a steam ship after lowering the casing lop-sided!

 

Depends on weather you prefer posing in a clean white or working in a scavenge white boiler suit.Like crew there are some good ones and bad ones.

 

Best - good steam ship
Worst - bad steam ship

 

Having sailed on both Steam, Diesel and Gas Turbine Vessels. I still like Steam the Best followed by the Gas Turbine. The daily maintenance on the Steam Ship is basically the Boilers, Soot Blowers, Burners, Fans, purifiers, heaters and Pumps. The Turbines and Generators are five year major overhaul.

At least with the Gas Turbine they got rid of the boiler but I would never get use to going above 120 per cent of speed on starting when paralleling the Gas Turbine. The Propulsion Gas Turbine did not have go above 100 per cent speed when starting. The company that I worked for would pull out the gas turbine and install the overhauled spare based on it's hours and vibration and the internal look around. The cables and hoses only fit one way so after unplugging and disconnecting the hoses all you had to do was to unbolt the turbine foundation and coupling. The Diesel we were pulling a piston very other port, changing out injectors, cleaning the scavenger spaces. The last ship I sailed on was a triple screw with three Slow Speed Engines and 30 pistons for the Mains. Four 16 cylinder Ships Service Generators (Cats) and a 16 cylinder Emergency Generator.

Joe

 

The Scoop

On the ACT 5 on her maiden voyage we had three colossal SNAFUS.
The condenser scoop was left on Automatic and scooped up a shoal of herring in Chesapeake Bay.The second one was the pair of FW ESD 3 Boilers were steaming nicely in mid Pacific,Panama to Wellington doing 23 plus knots,back pressure turbo alternators on,12 to 4 pm 3/E decided that one of the boilers needed blowing down as chemical test said so without checking with either the C/E or daywork 2/E.
The result was both boilers shutting down in classic cascade effect.
The first instance the lack of vacuum on the main condenser resulted in the turbine stops tripping and the boilers shutting down as the feed pumps tripped as well.
The second instance the boilers were on auto and the lead boiler was the culprit being blown down,consequently the follower shut down,the de-aerator emptied toute suit and not long after the Weir water
lubricated feed pumps tripped. In the ensuing panic the superheater vents were left open on both boilers while the auxiliary emergency feed pump was running.I had the unenviable task of opening the emergency feed check which seemed to take a donkeys age to open.
The result of this panic was all the feed water from the boiler being filled,as it was still hot all the water flashed off up the super heater vents until the penny dropped after the 2nd mate called down to enquire to the copious amounts of steam emanating from the funnel.
The third instance was when a piece of dirt found its way into the nozzle in one of the air ejector nozzles resulting in being unable to maintain full vacuum once the main engine got up to less than half ahead.The dirt got in there after a condenser inspection in Sydney from someone's daisy roots and the ship was off the North Cape when this happened,and everyone turned too looking for air ingress for nearly 24 hours before we got the job going again.
This was certainly a steep learning curve but I thoroughly enjoyed my first trip on a steam ship.

 

"Unmanned steam".

I sailed on the ACL ships "Atlantic Causeway" and "Conveyor".

They were, of course, steam-ships.

They were a massive step toward unmanned-engine-rooms. They had an alarm in each engineers cabin to alert him if there was any sort of problem in the engine room. (The alarm was "dedicated" to whoever would have been on watch.).

However it was decided, after trials etc., the control-rooms were to be manned at all times. (Llyod's? Probably.).

The automation on these ships was pneumatic, (Moore Products of the U.S.), and was incredibly efficient but there wasn't the "speed-of-control" you would get with electric automation. (Whenever a new "command" was input there was always a certain amount of "lag" until the controlled-medium "caught-up" with the controller).

Whether any engineer would have been quite happy to leave two FW roof-fired, 900 p.s.i. boilers, twin AEI turbines, VERY high-speed alternators, temperamental Weirs TWC turbo-feed-pumps, to look after themselves, whilst the ship hurtled along at 25 kts was never found out!!

Could you imagine having a final look-round before heading "up-top" with that lot "looking after itself"------------!!!!!

(The alternator "VERY high-speed turbines", (same manufacturer), whizzed round at 12,000 r.p.m. with the alternator doing 3,000 revs.).

'kin 'ell its nearly 40 years since I sailed on them and STILL remember the equipment, (and terror!!!!).!!! Salams, Phil (Hippy)

 

went for 3 months on a steam ship without a UMS alarm


and yes they were all functional