History of Steamships.

Timaru Herald, Volume XIC, Issue 13355, 3 August 1907, Page 2 (Supplement)

History of Steamships.

— — A HU ND KRD YEA ItS AC! O, AN 1> X < HY. In tlicso days of Lusitanias and Dreadnoughts, says "a. contemporary, it is interesting to turn back y, hundred leave* or so in the. great Book of lime ami trace these things from their beginnings. Though it is actually 'more than a hundred yean; since steam "was first successfully employed as a motive power for ships—for William. Svmmington built the Charlotte Dundas steam tug for use on the- Firth of Wide Canal as lung ago as 1802—next month is the. centenary of the launch, in America, on the waters of the Hudson, of the first steamboat that could be called a commercial success. In August, 1807. RobertFulton built and fitted there a steamboat called the Clermont, utilising in its construction some hints he had got from Svmmington, and getting his engines, from the firm of Boulton and Watt, as there was no shop in America then capable of making, them. " With splash and creak and groan," says a recent writer, " she worked her way up the smooth waters of the Hudson at less than five miles an hour, sighing along under a pressure of seven pounds of steam, her owners happy in having a score of passengers and a hundred tons of freight to carry." Many onlookers derided, others predicted calamity, but wise men saw in the vessel, crude as it was, the birth of a new giant force. Steam had come to stay. A description of this pioneer boat cannot but raise a smile. She was 140 ft long by 16ft wide and 7ft deep. Her boiler, made of copper plates, was so poorly constructed that it kept leaking, and the leaks as they developed were stopped with molten lead. The fire-box was of masonry. The boiler and engine and pad-dle-wheels were all exposed to the weather —quite uncovered.' What a world of thoughtful interest would be awakened could we but. put this baby of a hundred tons alongside one of the great Ounarders just launched, and compare their 785 ft of length with her 140 ft, their beam of 88ft with hers of 16ft, their 66ft of depth with • her 7ft, her half-deck with their eight decks, connected by electric lifts, her 20 horse-power engines with their 80,000, her four and a half knots in smooth river water with their 25 at sea! But only the unscientific would jeer; th» wiser could take off their hats to the genius of Fulton, recognising in the cockle-shell of his the germ- of the \leviathan alongside lier. Though modified ,in various details, and ■steadily improved upon, that panting, wheezy Clermont remained, in all its essential principles, the model for a generation, indeed up to our own tinies. Tho nrst : British builder to follow in Symmington's wake was Robert Bell, who five years after Fulton built the Comet, which plied Tegularly for passengers on the. Clyde in 1812. Fulton found his invention a money- ? making one, and in 1814 he was commissioned by the United States Government to bliild a-"steam war 1 , vessel—tha first. of "its'"'kind.- The interest awakened in the new motive force thus successfully harnessed; , and made, however imperfectly, to do man's bidding, was widespread. * By-and-by, people- began to discrxs the question, Would it be possible to construct a -.teamship to cross the Atlantic? Practical Qien said "Yes." ■• "No !'•' said leading scientists. As -early as 1819 an'; American ship the Savannah,, had creased from. Savannah to Liverpool in. 25 days, 18 of which she was imder . st-eam. But she was not a commercial success, and another nineteen years passed before any—vessel made the whole .passage under steam. Scientists said it cquld not be done. Dr. Dionysius Lard'ner, one of:the foremost,of them, committed himself to the statement, founded- as he believed.on incontrovertible data: "We have an extreme limit of ,a steamer's practicable, voyage without * re'ay of..coal a run of about 2000 miles."' The statement svas, however, speedily falsified, by facts. In. 1838 the . Sirius crossed from London to New York under steam in sixteen days, and proved, theorists notwithstanding, that it could be done. The Great Western and the British Queen speedily followed the Sirius. They were all paddle-steamers, increased speed being obtained by increasing the size of the .cylinder, until at last vessels were so full of machinery that profitable trade became almost impossible. But the introduction of screw propulsion, diminishing, the consumption of cod by about one-half, put a new complexion on the business. Though the invention was first brought into notice- in England, the conservatism of John Bull proved at the time insurmountable, and it was American energy and enterprise that. first embraced the'opportunity the new invention opened out. England waited till the experiment was a proved success, and her first screw ocean-going steamer was the Great. Britain, in 1843. The famous Great Eastern, designed by Brunei in 1852, was partly propelled' by paddle-wheels and partly by screw;! Had it been possible to fit her with more powerful machinery, how very different her fate might have been! To us the idea of equipping a vessel 680 ft long, 83ft beam, and 25ft draught, with screw-engines of only 4000 indicated h.p., 1600 nominal, and paddle-engines of only 2600 indicated h.p., and 1000 nominal, seems little short of absurd. But, unfor-

tunately for Brunei's masterpiece, it was the most thai could hs done at the tune, and it sealed her fate. The next great advance in machinery was the introduction of the double cylinder, and the superseding of simple engines by compound, abnui 1372. This rendered practicable the employment of larger vessel, and in 1881 the Liverpool shipowners astonished the world with the Alaska, fitted with double expeusion engines, and doing the journey to New York in six days! The name "Ocean Greyhound," was first applied to her? But the record 1 she established did not last long. Triple and quadruple expansion followed naturally on double, and vessels kept increasing in size and speed until they attained thtl dimensions of the North German Lloyd steamer Kaiser Wilhelm 11., which, with engines of 40,000 h.p., crossed the Atlantic in five daps, at a speed of knots. Further than this it seamed impracticable to go in shipbuilding. The trad-s to be done would not warrant the excessive expenditure, necessary to depose the Kaiser Wilhelm from its supremacy. But the Hon. C. A. Parsons cams opportunely to the rescue of British shipowneis, and the invention of the turbine proved th? must important departure known in the history of harnessed steam. The abandonment of the piston and the placing of what has been termed " a modified windmill " within the cylinder, the steam being driven against its vantG, which increase in size and exposed surface as the steam cools, effected 1 a groat economy of tspaco in the engineroom, increased speed, and proved much cheaper at all speeds over 14 knots. 'lhe turbine it was that rendered possible the two enormous 40.000 ton boats of Ihs Cunui'd line recently launched. With the introduction of thi' new principle of compulsion, many think we have reached the limit in the development in the use of stram The discovery of a now way of utilising the energy stored up in fuel, by extracting the gas7md using it explosively to drive the piston of an engine, may speodily again revolutionis-e - ship-building. At present it is claimed that the best produc.fr-gas-engnes. as the Amercans term the new machines, enable throe and even four time.; as much work to bo got. out of rnal ar. a, steam engine dr,.n. The principle is only yet in its infancy. We shall piobab'y hear of prodiicer-gas-tiirbiiies ere lone. Indeed. Mr Maxim has already suggested the building of warships thus equipped, and without funnels. '