(See No. 77.)
Wm. Barnum Cowles.—Lieutenant M. L. Wood’s paper on “ Speed Control in Modern Steamers ” can be discussed from two standpoints:
1st. The necessary change in the regime of the ship.
2nd. The practicability of the proposition.
From the first standpoint there is some danger of prejudice vitiating a clear judgment on the merits, for when human nature is called upon to break away from tradition and move in a new direction it shows itself possessed of far more inertia than matter, and this is more especially true where the human nature has had military training.
If the proposition affected materiel only there would be slight danger of prejudice, as the last twenty years have opened and broadened our minds very thoroughly in this respect. But the proposition, though not entirely new, is revolutionary in its effect on personnel, inasmuch as it puts the direct operation of the main engines of the ship in the hands of the officer or petty officer on the bridge or in the conning tower, and does not propose to relieve the officer below from the responsibility in maintaining the propelling engines and auxiliaries in good condition. This puts new duties upon the officer on the bridge, duties for which he has absolutely no training, duties involving a judgment and experience entirely out of his line and knowledge and which he could not by any possibility exercise, even if he possessed them, owing to his location; this is an added strain as well as a hardship and injustice to him. This also puts upon the officer in the engine room a very great increase of anxiety when—heaven knows I—his cup of that seems to be running over now.
Let me be very distinct about this point, for my friend Lieutenant Wood has, without intending to do so, entirely misconstrued the situation below decks when he assumes that his proposition relieves in any way the officer stationed there. With the multiplicity of duties involved in the operation and maintenance of modern engines, boilers and their legion of auxiliaries, the anxiety and strain on an officer are certainly ample when he has control in his own hands and can “ work out his own salvation,” but to put the control and operation in the hands of another, and that other removed entirely from the scene, still leaving the responsibility for the maintenance of good working on the shoulders of the officer below, is to increase the strain and anxiety upon the latter to a point beyond ordinary endurance and, under existing conditions, would be nothing less than reckless. This is a true and moderate statement of the situation below, and is not a matter of argument or opinion, but of fact.
Notwithstanding all this I agree with Lieutenant Wood that it would be a good thing for the efficiency of our war-ships if we could handle and control the motive power directly from the point where the movements of the ship are watched and controlled; and if this can be done in a manner to increase the efficiency of the ship as a whole, by all means let us have it regardless of persons or prejudices or individual hardships.
The régime of the ship must give way and be modified to suit improvements, when these have proved themselves to be such, and this in spite of any question of personnel; for the last word in any such case is patriotism—the good of the whole Navy, for the people, not for the Navy—the attainment of the most efficient combination of personnel and matériel in the fighting machines of the country.
From the second standpoint—practicability—I have seen and examined a number of small steamers, the largest about 100 feet long, which had their main engines operated from the pilot-house by separate and direct levers and rods to throttles and reverse bars. These were passenger boats. This method was adopted by their owners to gain quickness of manoeuvring in making a string of small landings close together. The boats were working satisfactorily when I examined them and the unusual feature was certainly an improvement.
The largest engines so operated were not more than 9 and 16 inches diameter by 10-inch stroke (compound, twins). From the above to a naval cruiser or battle-ship, however, is a far cry. I recollect reading some years ago (in the marine reports of the New York Herald, I think) of the captain of a French transatlantic liner claiming to have saved his ship from collision with an iceberg by reversing, from the bridge, one of the twin engines at one gulp from full speed ahead to full speed astern and throwing his helm hard over. As I recollect it the ship was fitted with a gear to stop or reverse the main engines from the bridge in cases of extreme emergency, this was the first and only time it had been used, and it was used then only as a dernier rcssort, the fog lifting and showing the berg dead ahead only a cable’s length or so—something had to go, so the captain, who was on the bridge at the time, instantly chose the chance of wrecking an engine. There was no published report from the chief engineer and nothing was said about any damage resulting in the engine room, so in this case the results were probably not serious. This was solely an emergency gear as I recollect it, and not used or intended for the regular operation of the engines.
There are doubtless other cases, hundreds of them, where small steamers have their engines worked from the pilot-house, but the case where large engines have been regularly worked in this way will be found lacking, I fancy. In fact, if it were safe to do it it would have been done and generally done in a large class of merchant vessels before this, because, aside from the danger to the engine and machinery itself, it is a most desirable thing to manipulate it from the bridge.
When we can get a way to make steam without water, a way to condense it without forming water, when we can virtually reduce the momentum of moving parts in a 10,000 H. P. engine to that in a 100 H. P. engine, when we can operate our main engines regardless of all immediate surroundings and conditions and connections, which the five senses of man are now often strained to detect properly and soon enough, then we can shut the engines up in a gas-tight, steam-tight, water-tight compartment and operate them from the bridge, or anywhere else we choose, by simply pressing a button or throwing a small lever with the pressure of a finger. That will send the “man at the throttle” to some other station—probably the bridge.
Lieutenant Wood seems to have put his attention on a mechanical means for operating the throttle and reversing gear from the bridge, and he proposes to operate them in unison, which will not do. This, however, is aside from the point; any one of a half-dozen schemes for doing this can be worked out with perfect success so far as the operating device is concerned. The real question is—What is going to happen to the engines and machinery when you get out of sight of them, out of hearing of them, out of touch with them, yes, out of taste and smell of them, and commence to “ make the wheels go round ” by pressing your button or lever on the bridge?
I say again, this idea of manipulating engines from the bridge is a most desirable thing, and we shall never have the perfect motor for driving a floating fighting machine until we have one which can be so operated, but the science of engineering has not progressed far enough yet to design and construct battle-ship engines and machinery which can be so operated with safety to themselves. It takes no prophet to predict that when we have such motors they will not be directly actuated by steam.