LINER ORC ADES

Dominion, Volume 30, Issue 255, 24 July 1937, Page 8

LINER ORC ADES

Successful Trials Run / LATEST ORIENT VESSEL * The new Orient liner Oreades ran her trials successfully on the Clyde hast week, according to advice received I by the Union Steam Ship Company. | of New Zealand, Limited. Built by Vickers. Armstrong. Ltd.. at Barrow-in-Furness, the Oreades is similar in appearance to the company's liner Orion, which visited Wellington last year. A sister ship in hull design to the Orion, the Oreades embodies, however, a number of improvements both as regards accommodation and propelling machinery. A handsome vessel, with straight, stem, single funnel and single mast, the Oreades has an overall length of 665 feet., with a moulded breadth of 82 feet and a gross tonnage of 23,390. Accommodation is provided for 463 first-class passengers in ir total of 303 single and two-berth rooms, and for 605 tourist passengers in 270 cabins. Public rooms are large and attractively decorated. Swimming baths are provided for both first-class and tourist • passengers. A full complement of lifeboats, including two motor-boats, litted with davits of the latest type, will be carried on A deck, these boats being capable of accommodating the whole ship’s company should necessity arise. For the safety of the vessel in case of fire, in addition to tile provision of the latest precautions for preventing and detecting fires, a complete installation of sprinklers is fitted so that a fire in any part of the vessel so protected shall be subdued automatically. Some of the woodwork in the passenger accommodation and crew’s quarters will be coated with tire-resisting paint. Fireproof doors I are fitted in all the main alleyways and all lift shafts. Besides this, the thermotank mechanical system of ventilation js fitted in all the other publie rooms and in the ■ accommodation of botli passengers and crew. The steering gear is of the electrohydraulic type, fitted with telemotor control from the navigating bridge and mechanical control from the docking position on C deck aft. The total complement of crew will be 466 people. Senior officers and engineers are accommodated in single-berth cabins, while petty officers are to be in two-berth cabins, eacli cabin being comfortably furnished in the latest style. The vessel is propelled by twin screws, driven by two sets of Parsons turbines, through single reduction gearing, each set comprising one high-pressure, one intermediate pressure and one low-pressure turbine, working in series .and driving separate pinions engaging with the mam gearwheel. . .... The high-pressure turbine is ot the im-pulse-reaction type, the first stage consisting of an impulse wheel with two rows of'blades and the remainder of this turbine comprising six stages of reaction blading mounted on a hollow drum of forged steel. The intermediate-pressure turbine is of the reaction type, having seven stages of blades mounted on a hollow forged steel drum. The low-pressure turbine is of the single-flow type, haying 16 rows of reaction blading mounted on forged steel disc wheels. The astern turbines comprise one high-pressure and one low-pressure, working in series. Ike high-pressure asjern turbine is incorporated in the intermediate cylinder com-prising-one impulse three-row wheel, the low-pressure astern turbine is incorporated in the low-pressure casing consisting of one two-stage impulse wheel, followed by five stages of reaction blading. All the turbines are designed to run at 1715 revolutions per minute, and the gear ratio is such that with this turbine speed, the propellers run at 112 revolutions, the total shaft horse-power to be developed on trial by the two sets of turbines at this speed being 24,000. The power to be developed astern is approximately <0 per cent, of the ahead power. The steam generating installation con-, sists of six Babcock and Wilcox type highpressure marine-type boilers built at Barrow. Four large boilers and two small boilers are fitted with superheaters and tubular air heaters. The boilers are constructed for a blow-off pressure of 4501 b. per square inch at the safety valves, the steam being superheated to 725 deg. Fahr. The total generating surface of the four large boilers is 29,860 square feet with a total superheating surface of 4600 square feet, the total generating surface of the two small boilers being 7170 square feet, with a total ■superheater surface of 1350 square feet. The air heating surfaces for the large and small boilers are 32,000 square feet and 8000 square feet respectively. The boilers are arranged to burn oil only under foraed draught closed air duct system with open stokeholds. Air is supplied to the boilers by five double inlet electrically-driven fans of Messrs. Howden’s make. The oil fuel installation consists of four units, each comprising one electrically-driven pump and one heater; one pair working and one pair standby. Two oil fuel transfer pumps of the electrically-driven two-throw type arc provided, each having a capacity of 60 tons per hour, for transferring oil to the settling tanks. Soot blowing arrangements are provided for the boilers and air heaters. The electric generating machinery consists of three main turbo-driven dynamos, each of 550 kilowatts at 220 volts, and one diesel-driven generator of 90 kilowatts at 220 volts. The Oreades will leave London on her maiden voyage on August. 27, when she will make a pleasure cruise to the Mediterranean. On her maiden voyage to Australia she will leave London on October 9, and is due at Sydney on November 18. (Picture on page 9.)