DESIGN AND CONSTRUCTION OF PASSENGER STEAMERS. 273 



The 23-knot ship was primarily intended for a coastwise run, but also for transpacific, 

 so that she is correctly rated as an ocean-going ship, though whether the full 23 knots would 

 be maintained on a deep sea run is problematic. 



The average length works out at 465 feet, a very modest figure for nine typical pas- 

 senger ship designs, and, omitting the 23-knot ship, the speed averages 15j^ knots. It 

 would seem fair to regard the high speed of 23 knots in a 450-foot ship as quite exceptional. 

 It is worth noting that 15^^ knots is quite modest for a 465-foot ship and that it checks up 

 with the tendency noted above. These ships are uniformly of the shelter or shade-deck types 

 with ample superstructures amidships and generally with forecastles. 



Fully half these inquiries were from foreign owners, an encouraging sign. 



Besides the above listed vessels, other inquiries not involving detailed design work 

 were received; they lined up well as to type with those given and do not change the indica- 

 tion of tlie trend. 



As regards proportion, the old and lingering tendency to narrow beam is at last giving 

 way; it is not going fast, but it is yielding to two influences; the old ship that capsizes 

 when handling light in harbor, unless ballasted, evidently is a nuisance, and has plagued a good 

 many people. The war has served to emphasize a tendency already to be seen by those on 

 the inside, and that is to give more metacentric height and listen less to the discomfort of 

 passenger talk that w-as so prevalent. 



A live passenger is worth several dead ones, even if he were fractionally more seasick 

 than the comfortably drowned ones. Personally I feel that you have to go to metacentric 

 heights far higher than the prevalent 18 or 24 inches in order to get appreciable discomfort; 

 in other words, get all the data you need by studying stability and rolling features in success- 

 ful ships, then adopt a G. M. about twice pre-war standards and you will have a ship that is 

 not too stiff. I cannot claim enough seagoing experience to dogmatize too strongly, though 

 I do believe that the talk of discomfort has been overdone, having been to sea a little in 

 almost all kinds of vessels, principally with high G. M. 



The other cause leading to more beam is the finding by Admiral Taylor and other 

 investigators Avorking in the experimental model basins, to the effect that more beam can 

 often be given a ship and enough coal saved by fining up (for the same deadweight) to pay 

 for the little extra steel weight generally involved. 



In other words, the bugaboo of narrow beam is under investigation and is getting to be 

 in a bad way. It must, however, be noted that stability considerations due to the flooding 

 of a damaged ship point to caution in increasing beam. 



War experience has given us a large volume of data concerning the behavior of flooded 

 and sinking ships, and this, intimately associated w^ith subdivision lessons, will ultimately 

 give us safer all-round ships. 



An interesting group of papers bearing on the subject of this paragraph was read at the 

 engineering conference in London last summer; the size of docks and ships was discussed, 

 also cargo handling facilities. What is said elsewhere as to the future of the large liner, 

 written by the author prior to the reading of a summary of these London papers, is borne 

 out; after the passing of present difificulties, these authorities look for the return of the large 

 liner, advocating dimensions for docks of 1,150 feet by 130 feet by 45 feet. 



BULKHEAD SUBDIVISION. 



This subject has been very much to the front since the spring of 1912, when the world 

 was shocked by the disaster which befell the Titanic. Our own transactions, as well as 



