ATLANTIC BLUE RIBBON.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LVI, Issue 150, 27 May 1936, Page 8

ATLANTIC BLUE RIBBON.

To-day the great liner, the Queen Mary, leaves Southampton on her maiden voyage across the Atlantic, and to secure tor Britain the speed record for the voyage. The ship herself is a marvel of mechanical construction, and illustrates quite vividly the remarkable development that has taken place in marine engineering and architecture. The Queen Mary is to-day the final word in this respect. The Italian liner Rex was in tier day the last word in ship building and she easily wrested the ribbon of the Atlantic from the previous holder, the Mauretania. The Erench liner Normandie which took to the sea last year beat the record of the Rex, and now comes the opportunity of the Queen Mary to snow what the British shipbuilders can do. It would now seem that finality has been reached in regard to the increase of size and. speed of ships with the standardisation of the latter at about 30 knots, whereby a weekly Atlantic service can be maintained with two ships. The future trend of design in respect of the former condition will, it is thougdit, lie in the attainment with smaller and yet smaller ships as the development of machinery permits, conditional upon the maintenance of profit earning space and carrying capacity at the proper economic level. In this connection it is not without significance that, in a recent paper, Dr Bauer, the designer of the machinery of the Bremen, illustrated the progress that could be made in high speed liner design by the employment of super-pressure steam generating conditions as distinct from the pressure of about 40t)-4801b, at present employed in the latest examples in this kind of ship. The machinery he simo-ested could be installed in the Bremen in place of the existing steam machinery, without alterations to the dimensions of the ship and would yield about 180,000 s.h.p. in comparison w r ith the present power output of 120,000 s-li.p., representing an increase of 50 per cent, in propelling power with a reduction of about 5 per cent, in machinery w r eight, and of 17.4 per cent, in the length of ship that would be taken up by the machinery, while an improvement of about 1 17 per cent .in specific fuel consumption would be obtained. It would be unwise to assume that the Queen Mary cannot be improved upon for speed and comfort. Marine engineers in all countries are devoting their attention to this, and new inventions are constantly being announced.

The Queen Mary is bound to be well patronised by the travelling public of Britain and America. She leaves as a full ship to-day for New York, where she is bound to create intense interest. Until about September or October she should earn big profits, but her harvest will be next year because of the King’s Coronation. The attention of the whole Empire, indeed of the world, will be riveted on the progress of the Queen Mary during the next three days. The world is certain to be kept well informed of her daily progress.