A MOTOR SHIP

Southland Times, Issue 19653, 2 October 1922, Page 6

A MOTOR SHIP

UNION COMPANY’S NEW VESSEL

A NOTABLE ADVANCE ' (Special to the Times.) CHRISTCHURCH, September 30. The cable message regarding Fairfields’ contract to build a new vessel for the Union Company’s Vancouver service affords striking evidence of the great strides which are being made in the development of internal combustion engines as the motive power for large sea-going ships. Hitherto the largest sea-going motor ships have not exceeded 10,000 tons gross register, and they have been chiefly cargo liners, of which the Glengarry and her sister ships of the Glen line—vessels of 9150 tons gross register and 14,000 tons deadweight capacity, with a speed of 13 knots on an oil consumption of 20 tons a day—are perhaps the finest of their type afloat. During the last year or two there has been a tendency to introduce the Diesel engine into passenger ships, but the problem to be solved lay chiefly in producing engines of sufficient size and power to give large motor driven passenger liners sufficient speed to enable them to compete with fast steam-driven ships. The principle oil engine-driven passenger ships in service at the present time are the Elder Dempster liner Aba, 7374 tons gross register, and the British India steamer Don) ala, which is of similar dimensions, both ships having a speed of about 13| knots. It will thus be seen that the new ship, which has been ordered for the Union Company represents a very great advance in size and speed over any oil engine driven ship afloat to-day. The Niagara, which, of course, is steam driven, and has been so successful in the Vancouver service, is a triple screw steamer of 13,415 tons gross- register, and is 524 feet in length. As the new ship is to be 600 feet in length it may be presumed that she will be of about 16,000 tons gross register, probably about the same geperal dimensions as the Aotea-Roa, which was nearing completion when the war broke out, and which was commissioned as H.M.S. Avenger. The auxiliary cruiser was afterwards torpedoed and sunk. The new ship, which will be by far the largest and fastest motor ship in the world, will be a notable addition not merely to the Union Company’s fine fleet, but to the British mercantile marine.