THE QUEEN MARY.

Auckland Star, Volume LXV, Issue 240, 10 October 1934, Page 6

THE QUEEN MARY.

LAUNCHING AND EQUIPPING

WHAT TRIALS MEAN.

(By BARNACLE.) So the Queen Mary its safely afloat. Some years ago, when on a flying visit to Scotland, I passed down tlie Clyde and had a fleeting view of many famous yards—including that of her builders, John Brown and Sons, Ltd. Incidentally, I embodied my impressions in an article which appeared in the "Star." So small and narrow, although deep, is the river that it seems almost incredible that such an enormous vessel could be safely floated 011 to such puny waters. Even our small pleasure steamer was not permitted to travel over six miles an hour on account of the injurious effects of displacement-wash on the river banks. So far the Queen Mary is not much more than a shell. The four tailshafts, to each of which will be attached its gigantic propeller (each costing a cool £7000) will be in place, but the turbines, the three funnels and her battery of boilers will be hoisted into place on the floating ship. The next move, a year of more ahead, will be the strenuous business of the "trials," that supreme test of the vessel's capacity to make the speed (and a dozen other things as well) contracted for; and then, if successful, the formal taking over by the owners. If the business of launching safely this huge bulk was an anxious time, no less will be the final water-borne tests before she adventures on her maiden voyage. Let us consider for a moment how much is at stake; what she has to do; what the contractors in her building agreed to provide; the accuracy of the complicated calculations involved, and so on. And she hat? to do it or the builders fail in their contract. The Machinery. Turbines, of course, but whether direct acting or turbo-electric, I have never seen mentioned. In all probability it will be the latter type as being more economical in fuelling. As a familiar example, the WellingtonLyttclton turbo-electric express steamer Rangitira, although far larger and more powerful than the Wahine 011 the same run, working on direct-drive turbines, I have been told by a marine engineer, actually cost less in fuel. Perhaps I should, here explain a little. In the turbo-electric system the turbines develop current which feed vast accumulators; in turn these accumulators feed electric motors turning the shafts. There is an easily understood broad principle in this multiple method of driving; in short, the run of the turbines can be maintained for varying speeds at a more even rate than in the case of direct drive. The accumulator! 5 , maintain a huge "stock" of latent energy for use as required. Lastly, electric motors run equally well ahead or astern. The Test. Perhaps no better description of full-speed trials can be given than that which appeared in the London "Daily Mail" of January 14, 1932, from the pen of Commander H. M. Daniel, R.N. The occasion was the trials of of the'new P. and O. boat Strathaird, 22,000 tons, 28,000 h.p., turbo-electric drive: "Twice every second, propellers each weighing 20 tons whirled inwards, so perfectly balanced that one was reminded of their existence only by the vibration of a few fittings on the aftermost bulkhead. . . . Back in the engine room all is now ready. . . . Steam is raging in the four boilers at more than four hundred pounds to the square inch. Now see what follows, and remen.ber that the Queen Mary is over three times the size of the P. and O. boat, with a maximum of 200,000 h.p. against the other's mere 28,000. "Every ten seconds eighty gallons of water is turned into steam hurtling through steel tubes surrounded by incandescent flames of the furnaces. . . . Within one-sixth of a minute of being water the steam has raced through the turbines . . . ; has been cooled in transit through 12,000 tiny cuproniekel tubes back into its natural liquid state, been swept into the whirlpool of a centrifugal pump . . . and forced back into the boiler against the pressure, to be again subjected to the furnacc blaze. "Six times a minute this mass of water madly turns to steam and back to water, driven crazy, it might seem, by the terrific heat. A message comes from the bridge, 'Stand by'; the whirling machinery is reverberating like a major chord played on a mighty organ. Two gongs, and the full-speed trial over the measured mile has begun; a dozen anxious faces scan the galaxy of dials and instruments. . . . The contacting engineer peers at the watt meter dial needle hovering just above the specified output. . . . The Giant and the Pigmy. The extracts I have taken are the words of an expert. But what will these tests be like in the ease of l the Queen Mary with 200,000 horse-power to deal with and a speed of at least 31 knots? Taking the P. and O. figures as a ratio basis, one gets some astonishing results as being probable when the monster begins her rush through the water. For instance, taking water alone, apparently the new vessel will, every ten seconds, turn into •steam 571 gallons against the 80 quoted; and 011 tho same basis, this huge mass of water, in one sixth of a minute, will have been turned into steam, passed through the roaring turbines, been condensed, and, in the form of water, bo back again in the boilers! Using tho same ratio as in the case of the water supply, that means a forward drive of 121.5 tons, or 304 tons on each of the four shafts. So one can begin dimly to understand why cuch propeller has cost £7000.

" COMMERCIAL ENGLISH." Once more business men have been getting it hot for the English stylo of their correspondence—this time in a paper read at the Drapers' Chamber of Trade Summer School at Oxford (says u writer in the "Manchester Guardian"). And certainly the stereotyped jargon of too many business letters—such phrases as "re yours of the 2;ith ultimo," "your esteemed favour of even date," "inter alia, market is on the quiet side." —is odious enough. But a defence might be made. The average business man would probably argue that amid a hurricane of distractions he has no time for anything but the ready-to-wear phrase, which he is at least certain his correspondent will understand. Not for him Oscar Wilde's idea of a "week-end of back-breaking work" which consisted in spending Saturday taking a comma out of a poem and Sunday in putting it in again. He might even point to some of the poets themselves. What about Browning's The pinnacled glory reached, and the pride of my soul was in sight. In sight? Not half! or John Rusk in vulgarly musing— Why leapest thou so high within ray breast? Thou little bounder, rest. or the same writer describing his newlyacquired estate at Brantwood, and writing: "and the sunset visible over the same"? That might be all very plausible. But one suspects that the business man's best defence would be the very human one of sheer laziness. For the assistance of all concerned, is it not time that the "British Terminology Committee," set up four years ago to consider the terms .used in business, issued their report ?