180 ELECTRIC AUXILIARIES ON MERCHANT SHIPS. 



It is only of recent years that electric auxiliaries have been introduced into ships. On 

 the earlier ships that I worked on, which included the Empresses running out of Vancouver, 

 which were built in 1890 in Barrow in Furness, no motors were installed though they were all 

 fitted up with the electric light — the Empress of Japan and the Empress of China had each 

 four dynamos which I worked on, the Empress of India having already been completed. 



There is a large field for the use of electric auxiliaries on board our merchant marine ; 

 there are still a good many places on ships where the electric motor might be used with ad- 

 vantage and, as already pointed out by our leading electricians in this country, including Mr. 

 Wordingham, late president of the I. E. E. and head of the Admiralty Electrical Department 

 during the war for ship works, that while there is a doubt as regards the economy of using 

 electric motors for driving our ships, there is no question of the advantage of the use of 

 electric auxiliaries over every other system, and they should be immediately installed on all 

 our ships; electricity should be used for all power purposes except the actual driving of 

 the ship. 



During the war I had a good insight into the fitting up of many of our latest warships 

 and merchant vessels, being sent by the army authorities to work in one of our large shipyards. 



With reference to Mr. Dickinson's remarks regarding the use of enclosed motors on 

 deck and partially enclosed below deck, the latter being shown on Plate 32, I take it this would 

 only apply in some cases, but surely not in the engine rooms and boiler rooms ; it need not be 

 necessary to- be watertight, but all openings would have to be covered to keep out dirt, oil 

 and dripping water, especially in the case of the turning motor, used for turning the main 

 engines in port, where it has to be fitted low down in the engine room and subject to be cov- 

 ered with dirt falling and water and oil dripping. 



I think the best power for use on board ship is unquestionably the direct current, as 

 pointed out by the author, but as the tendency lately is to use submersible pumps on board 

 ship, and as the same can only be worked by the alternating current, it will be necessary in 

 all up-to-date plants to have a rotary converter to supply current ; that is a point which has 

 been omitted by the author. As is well known, the squirrel type of A. C. motor will work 

 imder water. 



In the description of wiring systems, nothing has been said about the possibility of using 

 ring mains ; that is the only way to reduce the number of circuits as suggested by the author 

 in another part of the paper; the number of circuits on a distributing system cannot be re- 

 duced with safety ; a large number of circuits must be run to supply the different parts of the 

 ship, either for the lighting or power. 



I also notice the author does not recommend the use of conduits for carrying the wires 

 and cables. In this country the tendency at the present time is to use screwed conduits gal- 

 vanized wherever possible in the electric lighting of our ships ; in fact the latest Cunarder 

 being built on the Mersey, I understand, is mostly wired in galvanized steel tubes, solid 

 screwed. 



In most of the ships I have worked on recently the systems have been divided up. For 

 instance, on one ship armored and lead-covered cables are used in the engine room and boiler 

 room, casing on the passages, galvanized screwed conduits in the holds and portable fittings 

 in emigrant quarters. The last ship I worked on was a refrigerator ship of about 7,000 tons 

 for carrying bananas. She had three generators about 80 kw. each; most of the electric 

 power was used for driving huge fans for cooling the holds where the bananas were stored ; 

 all the passengers' quarters, of which a few first class were carried, and officers' rooms were 



