152 THE APPLICATION OF SMALL STEAM TURBINES 



get to the larger sizes it is of course a different matter. Another thing was that, in 

 those days at any rate, the electrical part of the equipment of a ship was a very 

 small proportion of the whole, and it was difificult to get the engineers to take suffi- 

 cient pains to learn the details of a new machine which they only considered a 

 very small part of their business. Thirdly, in some cases, these turbines were placed 

 transversely, across the ship, instead of being placed longitudinally, as they should 

 have been. With turbines placed transversely, and running at very high speeds, 

 there is a very heavy strain and danger of injury to the turbine, owing to gyro- 

 scopic action when the ship rolls. * * *" (See Journal Institute Electrical En- 

 gineers (England), Vol. XXIX, p. 612.) 



Among the earlier ships fitted with turbo-generators were the Earl Percy, 

 City of Berlin (Atlantic liner) and several battleships of the Benbow type — all 

 about the year 1888 (Plate 62). 



Among the earliest applications was the particularly interesting portable plant 

 designed for operating the searchlight of ships passing through the Suez Canal, 

 very few ships in those days being equipped with any electrical plant. 



The small high-speed turbo-generator made an ideal machine for this purpose 

 and was installed in a cage or crate with a projector which was hoisted on board 

 at one end of the canal and coupled up by a flexible steam hose on deck, and the 

 whole apparatus removed at the other end of the canal. 



In 1894, the first turbine-driven forced-draft fan was installed on a yacht 

 built by Ramage & Ferguson at Leith, and one or two sets were tried out on British 

 torpedo-boat destroyers, but owing to the combination considered necessary at that 

 time for high efficiency, namely, the high-speed turbine and screw type of fan, the 

 noise of the fan made its universal application prohibitive. 



TURBO-GENERATING SETS, 



The turbo-generator has become practically the standard unit for electrical 

 production in all navies and merchant marine, so that little need be said about this 

 application at the present time. (Plates 63 to y2 inclusive show some character- 

 istic types of modern turbo-generators for marine work.) It might be interesting, 

 however, in passing to quote the views of Mr. Horner in his paper before the recent 

 International Convention at San Francisco: — 



"As will be noticed subsequently in small vessels and freight steamers, where 

 the sets are of small capacity, say from 2 to 20 kilowatts, the prime mover is a re- 

 ciprocating engine. This unit possesses distinct advantages of operation from the 

 practical side, as such ships cannot carry an engineer expressly for the care of the 

 generating plant (page 1521). 



"Sets to exhaust into feed-water heater, main or auxiliary condenser, or to 

 the atmosphere. Condensing or non-condensing with approximately 8 to 10 inches 



