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Machinery |
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The DEs all tried to keep
their fuel "topped" off, incase of bad weather or extended
combat. They had to refuel at sea by passing a hose from the refueling
tanker. The thick black fuel had to be heated to about 250 degrees
Fahrenheit to get it to flow at a decent rate. When the heavy 6-inch
fuel hose was pressurized to 100 pounds per inch it took almost an hour
to transfer 95,000 gallons to the DE. Escorts and tankers were extremely
vulnerable while fueling because the entire operation was completed away
from the convoy (in case of an accident) and at a low speed, normally
about 9-10 knots. Big, slow moving targets...a submariner's dream.
On the right are a series of photographs of the USS Hemminger (DE 746) refueling from the USS Kaskaskia (AO27). After approaching the refueler a crewman would throw a small diameter weighted line, called a "messenger line," over to the oiler. The oiler crew would catch the line and pull over the heavier hemp rope, necessary to support the weight of the oil hose.
The DE crew would then pull the heavy oil hose over to their vessel, firmly attach it to the refuel point, and signal that all was ready for transfer. The hose required plenty of slack so the hose was not ripped off by surging seas. Spewing pressurized, heated fuel was considered a bad thing... You probably noticed the oiler crew is busy smoking during the fuel transfer, but did you see the second DE on the other side?
Both crews waited as the heated fuel oil was transferred. Don't these guys look excited? Notice the third DE about 250 yards back, patiently waiting for his turn for a "sip."
Unlike today where everything is nuclear powered, even carriers needed fuel. This is the USS Corregidor (CVE-58) receiving fuel from the USS Kaskaskia (AO27). All above courtesy of Robert E. Taylor, Email: taylor794@msn.com |
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There were many combinations of engines, generators, propulsion motors,
diesel engines and gear reductions used on Destroyer Escorts. Even if
DEs still existed, it would be almost impossible to catalog it
all. Yet, I'll try. There are two DEs remaining in the
United States; the USS Slater in Albany, NY and the USS Stewart in
Galveston, TX. Neither, unfortunately, use the same steam-turbine
electric drive propulsion, so finding photos of that equipment is
impossible...or is it? On February 2, 1969 the Republic of Mexico purchased the USS Barber (LPR-57, ex-DE-161, a Buckley-class Destroyer Escort that had been newly-overhauled as a High-Speed Troop Transport (LPR) in January 1969. The Mexican navy initially named it the “Coahuila”, and later renamed it “Vincento Guerrero”, which it is still named today. My research revealed this ship was still in service as a training ship in the Mexican navy in 1998. I contacted the Naval Attache' at the Mexican Embassy in Washington, DC and requested permission to visit, study and photograph the Vincento Guerrero. If approved, we'll have photos of a real Buckley engine room, along with whatever else I can photograph. In the meantime, this is the best I can do... |
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| General Description: Each Buckley had two complete power plants. The two power plants each consisted of a high-pressure, superheater boiler. These were each connected to a steam-turbine gear reduction unit. The gear reduction units were cross-connected to the main generator. In the event one of the two power plants failed, the other could continue to power the ship, although the maximum speed was reduced to 19 knots. Each motor-generator set provided mechanical power to the main General Electric 4,600 Kilowatt generator, which fed DC electricity to the two synchronous electric engines. Again, these were cross-connected to protect against total failure. While there are no Buckleys left in this universe, the power units below should be similar to the same as the power units on the Buckley's. This data plate is from the condenser unit of the steam boiler and should be identical to the ones installed in the Buckleys. The evaporator plant converted salt water into fresh water at a rate of over 9,600 gallons every 24 hours. The purified water had a salinity of less than five hundredths of a gram per gallon and was used for both the boilers and the crew's drinking supply. This is less salt than in Perrier bottled water. |  Evaporator Data Plate |
| The mechanical
oil burners could burn about 1,000 pounds of fuel per hour, which is
roughly 117 gallons per hour per boiler. To burn fuel at that rate, two forced-draft
blowers on each boiler had to force air into the firebox at a
phenomenal rate. The blowers were kept in sealed rooms to prevent
pulling air from below-decks. If the door was opened while the blower
was operating, one crewmember told me the vacuum was so powerful that it
sucked the cigarettes out of his shirt pocket when he was eight feet
away! (Another odd feature was each forced
air blower was equipped with a louver, which had to be closed if the
blower was not running. If left open, the opposite blower was powerful
enough to force air through the firebox and spin the inactive blower
blades backwards. The bearings in these blowers were designed to
run in only one direction, so when the blades spun backwards, the
bearings soon burned out.) (One more piece of trivia: Alcohol is not
permitted on USN vessels, so sailors used to ferment their own.
Unfortunately for them, the smell released during fermentation was
easily recognized and their secret "stash" was usually
discovered by the officers. On a small ship it was especially hard to
hide their fermenting "raisin jack." One crewman told me he
successfully made hundreds of gallons of raisin jack in the
forced air intakes during his six-year hitch. He correctly figured the
forced air blowers sucked all the smell into the boiler and burned
it. He never got caught.) The blowers sucked air from above-decks and forced it into the firebox, swirling in a clockwise direction. At the same time, the fuel injectors swirled the fuel into the firebox in a counter-clockwise direction. In the firebox, the two vortices (continued below) .... |
 Forced Air Blower |
| one of fuel, the other of air collided, in this mechanical boiler, where they mixed thoroughly and burned efficiently. The boiler was lined with copper coils in which the water flowed, circulating around the boiler as many as seven times before exiting as "dry steam" and reached pressures of up to 600 psi. This was called "superheating." Some of the steam was siphoned off to heat the ship, cook with, and run a small generator (shown below). The rest was filtered to remove condensing water droplets and forced through a turbine blade, converting steam power into mechanical power. The turbine turned a shaft at an extremely high speed, much too fast to connect directly to the ship's propeller, so it connected to a gear reduction unit to slow down the speed. | 
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| This is a picture of a gear reduction unit, very much like a Buckley's. The turbine blade fed into this gear reduction unit where the speed was slowed down to the speed required by the GE Electric Generator. The Buckley GE power plant produced 2,700 volts at 93-1/2 cycles per second. Unfortunately, I do not have a picture of a Buckley-sized generator, but here is a smaller-scale one (below). |  Gear Reduction Box |
| This is a
GE Generator that is rated at only 425 horsepower. It is connected
to the steam-turbine speed reduction unit (see below).
The second photograph is of the data plate on the generator.
The speed reduction unit for the 425 horsepower generator above. |
GE Generator
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(Hey! Where
does that pipe go? Engine rooms of steam-driven ships are a
maze of pipes, valves and mysterious boxes. The level of complexity is
incredible!)
Once the steam passed through the turbine, passed through an evaporator, which boiled sea water and converted it into drinking and bathing water for the crew. (The fresh water went into a large holding tank built into the hull around the engine room, where it acted as additional shielding, in the event of a torpedo hit. The guys on the condenser crew had unlimited water for drinking and bathing. They also cooled their fresh melons and drinks in the water tank.) This partially re-condensed the water before it arrived at the condenser, where it was converted back to water to be recycled and passed through the system again and again. |
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| The control panel was the "brains" that controlled the entire process. I won't pretend to understand this panel. I couldn't even find the key hole for the starter... |  |
| Engineer's workstation on the Kidd. Notice the clipboard on the right. It holds original maintenance information from the 1940s. Talk about realism... You would think you stepped back in time. The speaker system in the engine room even plays 1940s music! |  |
| Trivia: In 1943, the USN had problems training DE crews quickly, with both men and training facilities in short supply, but the Navy convinced the General Electric Company to build two full-sized operating versions of both the steam-turbine and the diesel-electric power generation plants. The training facilities were located in Syracuse, New York and Cleveland, OH. | |
| Trivia: The DEs had an occasional habit of tripping their own main circuit breaker whenever encountering rough seas or following a shallow depth charge explosion. In the Buckley class, this was an especially bad thing because their electric motors came to an immediate "all stop". Crews referred to this as "breakeritis". | |
