[Hugh Ferguson]

Interesting thread this! From a deck point of view my memories of steam triple expansion engines was of being stuck in Le Havre for a week whilst they unshipped one of the pistons for it to be taken ashore for straightening!
The 2nd engineer had neglected to open the draincocks during a stop movement.

 

[geokap]

Triple expansion steam engine

when i was on my apprentiship my second vessel was small cargo 4000 gt .was build in Germany during the 2nd world war .
I managed on board about 8 months .8 months4-8 watch with the second engineermy watch have to blow the tubes take sample water from port and starboard boils and the hot well tank. every hour fil the crank shaft with my hand and to keep pace i was singing song in the same tempo.
Make sure the oil tanks were top up for the next watch and the rest of the day,the chief was complaining were using too much oil and the miserable use to reduse the dose in the lubricators.
After watch some breakfast and down in the engine room to change the terry towels of the hot well wash them and from the previous day with the palm deedle sew the dry ones . No force draft fans just turn against the wind the wind tybes.
Good all days and on top of that to do electrical repairs.110 volt dc with negative on the ship .

 

[Chillytoes]

All the talk about packings and he like reminded me of when I was a dockyard apprentice working on turbines. What a tedious job checking the clearances with the top cover lifted on Parsons end-tightened units!
But there was one thing I never found out and that was a process on the turbine bolts called, I am sure, "aqua-dagging". What was that all about? All I remember was that these bolts were covered with what looked like graphite after their return from the above treatment.
Any answers, anyone?

 

[wterdbeard]

According to my father and grandfather, now no doubt feeling Satan's bottom ends,in a place where all marine engineers eventually sign on. Fighting battles with firemen and kicking lazy donkeymen on the backside

 

[Bob gibson]

A lot of memories here, a lot I forgot about, was on a ship with a parsons three stage turbine, Mirrellees diesels, and a turbine generator, this ship was DC power, when starting the bilge pumps we had to slowly rank up the power,
we would pump out the water to an acceptable level , then switch pumps to the separators to reclaim the oil in the bilges, we always carried a wheel spanner, the diesel engines were used in port to supply power and a donkey engine ran to supply hot water to the ship. As soon as the main engine was stopped, it was the juniors job to turn the the turbines over with a cranking motor every ten minutes till it cooled down. It was amazing , once under way, you could go around the engine room, and take a hundred temperatures/ pressures return back , and enter everything into the main engine log. There was always a senior engineer and a junior on watch, along with a donkey man, during maneuvers the sparky filled in the movements book. I to remember the white cross's on the valve chest of the weir feed pumps, and I'm sure in those days we used to lip read, it was no good shouting above the noise of the gear box, the worse job was taking the temps of the super heaters, 900 degrees c comes to mind,
quite took your breath away. salt tablets as big as horse pills, 16 a day would be the norm in the tropics, and that *****ly heat, coldish showers, laying on your bunk with a rash on all your extremities, covered in calamine lotion, not nice! I'm sure our hands had built in thermometers, 55 c was the max you could stand for five seconds. In the early seventies we still got our weekly tot of rum,. it was Four Bells rum from memory, my only failing was I could not understand the chiefs (Glasgow accent) so the engine telephone was always handed over to someone who could

 

[Hugh Ferguson]

What I would dearly like to know is what engineers in steamships are doing on Earth!!!???

 

[chadburn]

It's all that oil, grease and graphite that has preserved us.

 

[Bob gibson]

Ah could do with a bit of gland packing meself at the moment!

 

[sparks69]

Remember "Whitfields Ointment" as a treatment for P - Heat ? Well I can assure you it does not work especially when applied to ones privates. As the man said Happy Daze.

 

[submarine]

On the Benvrackie the chief steward kept a supply of Pears soap bars to help sooth the itch, and it was safe all over. It seemed to help.

 

[chadburn]

Ah could do with a bit of gland packing meself at the moment!

Greasy Hemp?(*))

 

[alan ward]

In a former post i referred to '*****ley heat ' but the system removes some letters as being sear words so I shall try to spell it another way so we can get a response . " Pr1kly Heat " Anyone who was in the Red Sea Gulf area knows of this . Not all got it but when you did it was not Fun .
Derek

Despite 10 years away and numerous holidays to seriously hot places like Malta,I got *****ly heat in Greece a couple of years ago,that heatwave where people were dying,it was not a pleasant experience at all.

 

[Jocko]

Being a deisel engineer I somehow did a trip from Greenock to Durban etc on the SS Baron Inverclyde. The old Up and Downers were real primitive. No gauges on the open crankcase. You had to feel the bottom ends by slapping them as they were on the down stroke and hope that there wasn`t a piece of shim sticking out. The main bearings had a pile of cotton waste on top and you had to keep pouring the crankcase coolant on them. It`s true about the superheated steam. Very dodgy. When you climbed up to check a sight glass you always stuck a spanner up first or you would lose a hand. This was in 1959 and I don`t recall it being any hotter than a deisel, we still had to take those huge salt tablets. The Pr***ly Heat was a real pain, even when home on leave when you walked from a cold street into a warm pub you were scratching all over and people probably thought that you had fleas. The Inverclyde was dead slow, I think she only did 8 knots and they used to say that the Portugese-men-o-war passed us. Three cheers for the deisels!

 

[Ian J. Huckin]

Embroidery?

 

[Bob gibson]

There was not a lot to do ! I spent the time making all my own frocks(Thumb)

 

[BlythSpirit]

What I would dearly like to know is what engineers in steamships are doing on Earth!!!???

Hugh you must know we were sent down to take good care of you mere mortals!

 

[Ian J. Huckin]

There was not a lot to do ! I spent the time making all my own frocks(Thumb)

Then there was the flower arranging, and learning new make-up techniques....

 

[Engineers descendant]

Following up on the question, "What on earth did engineers on steamships do?"

My great grandfather was a Ship's Engineer, and my great-great grandfather was a Ship's Chief Engineer. They both lived in Belfast, Northern Ireland and did frequent runs to England and Dublin, as far as I know.

I am trying to find out the answer to the question that Brian posted on here in 2004. I am attempting to keep the memory of what these men did alive within my family by compiling stories and histories about their lives. Brian did anyone ever write an account, explaining in detail the answer to your post? I'd love to see it if they did. I've read the responses here on this forum, and checked out the Stokers and Trimmers forum, but the language is often "over my head" so to speak and it's difficult to understand it enough to piece it all together. I am not a seafaring person so I need layman's terms!

Thanks for any help I can get on this,

Julie

 

[Chillytoes]

Julie,
Apart from the many posts here on what Engineers on steamships did as part of their normal (and not so normal) duties, here are a couple of textbooks that cover the subject and which a local library might have on it's shelves.
"Marine Steam Engines And Turbines", Fox & McBurnie - there is a brief description in Ch.1 on 'Setting Watches', 'Engine Room Procedure', etc.
"The Running And Maintenance Of Marine Machinery", Inst. of Mar Eng. - the third Chapter has 14 pages relating to reciprocating engines and the various auxiliaries.
"The Marine Steam Engine" , Sennett & Oran - at the end of this book is a rather extensive section on 'Raising Steam and Getting Under Way', Management Of Engines Under Way', etc. This last book is rather older, my edition is 1918. The first edition was 1882.
In the late 1890's and early 1900's there were a number of books published under titles such as "Breakdowns At Sea and How To Repair Them". Some of the stories are absolutely amazing.

 

[murrayis]

For those of you that might not be aware, there are still Engineers (and the rest of the crew) sweating it out on a couple of coal fired steamers in the Australian tropics. These 51035GRT ships are due for disposal this year. It would be good if any of their Engineers could pen a current day log of their duties to compare with that of the olden day steamers.