CSSHEGEWISCHThe price of gas has been dropping recently. The price of beans has gone down.
Russell
BaltACD Murphy Siding Some weather we've been having.... The price of gas has been dropping recently.
Murphy Siding Some weather we've been having....
The price of gas has been dropping recently.
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
csxns 54light15 this is a train forum Begining to wonder
54light15 this is a train forum
Begining to wonder
Thanks to Chris / CopCarSS for my avatar.
It is a internet forum for crying out loud! Threads go where the go! Deal with it.
Great discussion.. off topic a little is fine I think so long as it doesn't get political..
Yeah - but sometimes one learns something new, and that's not all bad.
Larry Resident Microferroequinologist (at least at my house) Everyone goes home; Safety begins with you My Opinion. Standard Disclaimers Apply. No Expiration Date Come ride the rails with me! There's one thing about humility - the moment you think you've got it, you've lost it...
SeeYou190- yes, this is a train forum but anything that burns coal seems to be welcome here. What's not to like about a steam powered anything? I well recall the various railroad tugboat and car float fleets in New York when I was a kid. I recall there being real "steam" shovels on construction sites in Manhattan in the early 70s. In the 90s there was a steam powered dredge in the Hudson river at Poughkeepsie. I saw the plumes of steam coming out of a narrow stack whenever it raised its bucket. I wish I could have gotten aboard but it was near the middle of the river. I wonder if it still operates? It's American Thanksgving today and if I'm thankful for anything, it's steam!
Pennsy's steamer "Virginia Lee".
Jones 3D Modeling Club https://www.youtube.com/Jones3DModelingClub
Getting back to a railroad theme, for a period I rode on the Eire-Lackawanna ferries that all except one was steam powered with some poor guy with a shovel in the boiler room making all that noise while the engine was realatively quiet. At that time,1959 to 1964 all the railroads in New York harbor had large fleets of steam tugboats as well as ferries.
Wow,
.
You guys over here in the Trains message boards sure get way off topic easily.
I did learn a lot about steam ships.
-Kevin
Living the dream.
SD70DudeRE: Britannic, wasn't it all the open portholes on the lower decks that allowed water to flood more compartments even after the watertight doors were closed?
That certainly didn't help. But note all the 'sinking' that had to occur in a fraction of 15 minutes to put the first row of portholes below water ... you wouldn't get this only from mine damage to the bow.
The other thing to remember about Britannic, and the 'lessons learned' from Titanic, was the death toll. Of sick and injured, with no advance warning.
The man who owned Soldier's Fortune, about which I commented in another thread, was a good friend of Bruce Ismay. He understood quite a bit more about the situation with IMM and White Star than most of the critics seem to have done. I have to confess now that I had relegated Ismay to the place most of his critics love to put him. (Much as Aaron Burr seems to have been relegated, for even less actual cause, but that's another story...) It appears that in many respects, I was mistaken if not in fact prejudicedly wrong.
Pride in a job well done is quite a different thing from hubris. On the other hand, rubbing one's hands at successfully monetizing steerage while permitting high perceived luxury, which really is a marketing triumph, might be inviting karma to an extent.
I don't think it is fair to blame 'covering up' a minor bunkerage fire, or the New York incident, on excessive pride, no matter how much fun popular contemporary songwriters or their modern-day equivalents may have had with the themes. And there is this continuing drumbeat of enthusiasm for the idea that Ismay ordered high speed 'to try for the Blue Riband' ... in a ship obviously constructed (with quad-expansion engines and a vacuum turbine only turning one way) for high efficiency at medium speed.
SD70Dude BaltACD Ulrich Yup, and that's what makes me nervous about flying lately too. A combination of cavalier attitude.. watching the uniformed kids on the flight deck as I board.. recalling how little I paid for the flight and wondering what portion of that pittance is allocated to safety.. Remember - when you get to our age - anyone that is actually working is a kid. Even though that kid might be 50 years old with 30 years exprerience in their profession. It's not just about age and experience, it's about one's level of intelligence and knowledge about their profession. At work we have some specific 20-something engineers and conductors who are far smarter and safer than some of their retirement-aged co-workers. The various cost-cutting in an attempt to undercut each other's fares is a legitimate concern, one can only cut so much before safety starts to be compromised.
BaltACD Ulrich Yup, and that's what makes me nervous about flying lately too. A combination of cavalier attitude.. watching the uniformed kids on the flight deck as I board.. recalling how little I paid for the flight and wondering what portion of that pittance is allocated to safety.. Remember - when you get to our age - anyone that is actually working is a kid. Even though that kid might be 50 years old with 30 years exprerience in their profession.
Ulrich Yup, and that's what makes me nervous about flying lately too. A combination of cavalier attitude.. watching the uniformed kids on the flight deck as I board.. recalling how little I paid for the flight and wondering what portion of that pittance is allocated to safety..
Remember - when you get to our age - anyone that is actually working is a kid. Even though that kid might be 50 years old with 30 years exprerience in their profession.
It's not just about age and experience, it's about one's level of intelligence and knowledge about their profession.
At work we have some specific 20-something engineers and conductors who are far smarter and safer than some of their retirement-aged co-workers.
The various cost-cutting in an attempt to undercut each other's fares is a legitimate concern, one can only cut so much before safety starts to be compromised.
True enough, and I do remember my own youth.. showing up at a loading dock with a T/T and getting asked for my licence. (I'm told) I looked 15 or maybe 16 when I was 19.. Nobody makes that mistake anymore..
That painting of the sinking Lusitania is by Ken Marschall. If you see a book of his paintings, grab it.
Greetings from Alberta
-an Articulate Malcontent
UlrichYup, and that's what makes me nervous about flying lately too. A combination of cavalier attitude.. watching the uniformed kids on the flight deck as I board.. recalling how little I paid for the flight and wondering what portion of that pittance is allocated to safety..
Overmod I wish we could know with any assurance whether or not the British were lying about the type and size of munitions load ... the latest I remember reading was that it was mostly small-arms ammunition, not major explosives or high-order material.
I wish we could know with any assurance whether or not the British were lying about the type and size of munitions load ... the latest I remember reading was that it was mostly small-arms ammunition, not major explosives or high-order material.
As you know that the British Government and the Royal Navy shamelessly lied and suppressed the truth for almost 100 years, kept changing their lines to take year after year, they are not trustworthy I am sure. Victims of the Lusitania are still buried with undetonated depth charges and underwater explosives, ... sometimes I don't really understand that why I still have faith in humanity.
RE: Britannic, wasn't it all the open portholes on the lower decks that allowed water to flood more compartments even after the watertight doors were closed?
Yup, and that's what makes me nervous about flying lately too. A combination of cavalier attitude.. watching the uniformed kids on the flight deck as I board.. recalling how little I paid for the flight and wondering what portion of that pittance is allocated to safety..
The Titanic began the trip with a fire in one of the coal bunkers, which required a few days to extinguish, but there is no evidence that it contributed to the cause of the sinking or added to the disaster.
However, what the fire does do is provide one of several indications of the incredible hubris surrounding the so-called “unsinkable ship.” This attitude is probably the overall cause of the sinking because it promoted risk taking to prove the ship’s invincibility and win the business competition at stake in the first voyage.
The attitude manifested itself in several ways, including a lack of caution in speeding through the ice field, suppressing the “black eye” news of the coal bunker fire, nearly causing a collision as the ship sped out of the harbor, and providing only enough life boats for an unsinkable ship.
This attitude was in the ship’s marketing, and had become well known as the ship was being constructed. It worried people who instinctively knew the human downside of having too much pride. It led to a popular feeling that the ship was jinxed. People reported premonitions of the disaster. Some even canceled their trip out of fear as the day drew nearer.
To me, this is the truly incredible drama of the Titanic story. It should have been the centerpiece of the movie.
BaltACD It is believed that Titanic sailed from England with a fire in her coal bunkers.
It is believed that Titanic sailed from England with a fire in her coal bunkers.
Yes, I actually believe that theory which explained what actually happened; this theory explained a lot of unanswered questions about the sinking of the unsinkable ship. After years of waiting, I am glad that I finally know what really happened.
By the way, judging from the forward A-Deck promenade, the ship in the pic should be Titanic's sister ships RMS Olympic
I love the RMS Lusitania more than the RMS Titanic. If I was a billionaire in that era I would insist to take the Lucy. She was a bit smaller but fast enough to save me one travel day. Let alone the interior was much more classy.
RMS Lusitania. Slender and well proportioned; powerful and fast, classy and luxury.
There is a Naft Oil Company and several ' fuelling stations' in the Toronto area. Saudi owned.
BaltACDAre you meaning 'naphtha' - much nastier than coal
'naft' was an Islamic term for what we'd now call 'petroleum' -- hydrocarbon material coming out of the ground.* Back in the day there was 'white naft' and 'black naft' (corresponding to different kinds of crude, still encountered today). I have sources in the history of technology but it will take me some time to spin them up -- it's been years now. Where did the time go?
No light hydrocarbon mixture would find much use in steam generation at liner size, and yes, the explosion and vapor hazards alone would make 'naphtha' or even the lighter fractions of gas oil undesirable for firing liners (even if they did not have higher opportunity value for other purposes).
I did not look carefully at the specific fractions used for oil torpedo boat fuel in the late 19th Century, but I don't believe they were like the 'white gasoline' or similar fuels used in many contemporary steam automobiles or flash plants. A reasonable place to start reading is the Office of Naval Intelligence General Information Series IX (June 1890) chapter XI, which is about a decade newer than the first 'treatises' on practical locomotive oil firing I have read.
BTW: Yes, I checked, and Turbinia was coal-fired ... and from the available photographs with comparatively little forced draft visible in her exhaust plume kinetics, despite stories that her funnel glowed under hard running...
*What 'naft' originally meant was apparently combustible or explosive liquid, probably at least similar to Greek fire, and then by extension in military context, explosive.
tree68Any problems in/with the coal bunkers on the Titanic may have exacerbated the problems, but I suspect the gash left by the iceberg was the primary issue.
What, not the torpedo?
The only real 'contribution' the fire is supposed to have made, if I recall the discussions correctly, was to weaken the bulkhead of fireroom 5 in such a way that it failed early, thereby accelerating the rate of the sinking. I do not remember if anyone ran the numbers to see if getting a collision mat across the gap there (said to be about 5' but the seam opening might have been far more than that) would have kept the ship either from filling or breaking 'long enough' to permit one of the liners to reach her ... it was only a matter of under 60 miles physical separation as I recall.
While the cause of the explosion that sunk the Britannic remains unknown (possibly a mine), it's said that the flooding that occurred thereafter was actually worse than that on the Titanic, despite the fact that changes were made in the design after the Titanic sank.
I thought it was fully accepted that the cause was a mine; it sure as heck wasn't hospital supplies. The "issue" was whether the mine could cause enough mechanical damage to produce a sinking that fast -- it was a principal reason to access the damaged area either from inside or outside to assess this. If I recall correctly the 'conclusion', such as it was, was that the damage couldn't be seen well enough to judge.
On the other hand, it was CERTAIN that the ship went down too fast to beach, and I see (1) no cause that would produce this except wholesale opening of seams to water, and (2) no direct shock from mine detonation that would open seams to that extent. On the other hand, a critical-mixture coal-dust explosion would certainly serve, and if I recall correctly, contemporary reports of the sequence of events confirm secondary shock. The incident occurred in reasonably warm water, so no 'rivet embrittlement' issue could possibly apply as it might on Titanic.
The second explosion on the Lusitania has been possibly laid to the boilers exploding, although it has been reported that there were over 100 tons of munitions on board.
Scotch boilers would not explode all together if exposed to sea water, nor would the result produce rapid sinking of the pattern observed. I also doubt that the magnitude of munitions reported to be aboard could have been prompt initiated to produce enough damage to sink a ship that size that fast. I wish we could know with any assurance whether or not the British were lying about the type and size of munitions load ... the latest I remember reading was that it was mostly small-arms ammunition, not major explosives or high-order material.
I thought big ships used heavy oil like bunker C, and small motor boats like a launch used naphtha.
Overmod Well, this thing called 'naft' that occurs in the Crimea and some other places. Known to work really well for steam generation by the early 1880s. Perhaps the only workable fuel for torpedo boats.
Are you meaning 'naphtha' - much nastier than coal
WikiPedia Health and safety considerations[edit] The safety data sheets (SDSs) from various naphtha vendors are also indicative of the non-specific nature of the product and reflect the considerations due for a flammable mixture of hydrocarbons: flammability, carcinogenicity, skin and airway irritation, etc.[12][13][14][15] Humans can be exposed to naphtha in the workplace by inhalation, ingestion, dermal contact, and eye contact. The US Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has set the permissible exposure limit for naphtha in the workplace as 100 ppm (400 mg/m3) over an 8-hour workday. The US National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) has set a recommended exposure limit (REL) of 100 ppm (400 mg/m3) over an 8-hour workday. At levels of 1000 ppm, which equates to 10% of the lower explosive limit [1% = 10,000 ppm], naphtha is immediately dangerous to life and health.
The safety data sheets (SDSs) from various naphtha vendors are also indicative of the non-specific nature of the product and reflect the considerations due for a flammable mixture of hydrocarbons: flammability, carcinogenicity, skin and airway irritation, etc.[12][13][14][15]
Humans can be exposed to naphtha in the workplace by inhalation, ingestion, dermal contact, and eye contact. The US Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has set the permissible exposure limit for naphtha in the workplace as 100 ppm (400 mg/m3) over an 8-hour workday. The US National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) has set a recommended exposure limit (REL) of 100 ppm (400 mg/m3) over an 8-hour workday. At levels of 1000 ppm, which equates to 10% of the lower explosive limit [1% = 10,000 ppm], naphtha is immediately dangerous to life and health.
Any problems in/with the coal bunkers on the Titanic may have exacerbated the problems, but I suspect the gash left by the iceberg was the primary issue.
While the cause of the explosion that sunk the Britannic remains unknown (possibly a mine), it's said that the flooding that occurred thereafter was actually worse than that on the Titanic, despite the fact that changes were made in the design after the Titanic sunk.
NittanyLionDumb compared to....what other fuel that was readily available?
Well, this thing called 'naft' that occurs in the Crimea and some other places. Known to work really well for steam generation by the early 1880s. Perhaps the only workable fuel for torpedo boats.
Plus, attributing the loss of those three liners to coal-related incidents drifts heavily into paraphrasing Pickett's and saying "I've always thought the torpedoes had something to do with it."
I am thankful to you for pointing out that Titanic and Britannic were sunk by torpedo ... I guess I learn something new on forums nearly every day.
Do you really think that one obsolete torpedo could sink a ship the size of Lusitania in that short a time ... absent a secondary explosion of such magnitude as to lead generations to think there had to be substantial secret armaments aboard? (Or that a mine hit on the bow would sink a ship the size of Britannic in the time it did?)
In both cases, the shock of the munition explosion caused levitation of the coal dust in the bunker structure and probably provided a prompt ignition source for a critical-mixture deflagration or worse to propagate around the ship, knocking riveted seams loose with pressure and shock. Yes, the explosives had 'something to do with it' but likely far less in both mass and action than the fuel-related explosions. And this before we take up the issue of prompt IR detonation in carbon powder (as at Flixborough, where some of the propagation likely took place at a fair proportion of lightspeed...)
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