Probably didn't order too much paint - you lot didn't do enough painting...
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Probably didn't order too much paint - you lot didn't do enough painting...
Hi David.
In the 40s and 50s when the tide went out in Swansea Bay you had to wade through crude oil to reach the sea, surprised no one took it up as a skin product.
Des
Painting ship please lads - crude oil spills etc should be a separate Thread if someone wants to start one and to tell of your experiences of spills and accidental pumping overboard - please stay on topic - thanks.
Most ex-Port Line deck hands will recall favourably or otherwise, how the company maintained a very high standard of paintwork on runs to Aus and NZ. This maintenance required considerable overtime - at least it did on my Port Line voyages. Overtime meant money - clearly, which most hands were willing to work for and gather. Overtime hours worked were of less consequence.
In the mid 1950's horror struck as the bosun's mate handed out a new device, which went under the name of a 'Paint Roller', to replace the wide brushes previously used. One didn't need to be an Einstein to realise painting would now be faster and overtime slower, to the detriment of money which would be less. Over-the-side and funnel painting was not the same afterwards.
During the late 1940's/early 1950's there existed a small ship dry-dock at Auckland, now long gone. Sometimes, on a Saturday, Port Line deck hands would be asked to work on a ship in the dry-dock, mainly chipping hammer jobs, plus red-leading. This was a favoured task as earnings were in cash often before sailing. All work done at the dry-dock was approved by our ship's First Mate who also doled out the incoming cash in those now olde fashioned tiny brown envelopes. No-one would dare ask how the amount had been calculated. Horrors again when paint rollers turned up at the dry-dock.
Ken T
R412277
I remember a similar situation when electric chipping hammers arrived, overtime out the window, you could cover an area twice as large as a days hammering, also remember making your own little stool for chipping, or use a fender, kt
I never served on tankers, but did, t windy hammers have bronze heads, or some similar metal to prevent sparks ?. I remember hearing the story, true or not, that when the electric chipping hammer arrived, one of the guys seeing his overtime up the Swanee, started the thing up and stuffed the head in a bag of waste !!!, obviously burned the thing out, kt
Keith, as far as I recall they did not have bronze heads, however they did carry large kits of bronze tools for work in pump rooms and down tanks, however after the Shell tanker Mactra blew up, Shell carried out extensive research into the cause and discovered that bronze tools were potentially more hazardous than steel.
Apparently the bronze accepted a charge more readily than steel and also discharged more readily with a higher intensity spark; so an order was issued to the fleet, all bronze tools to be dumped over the wall, must have cost a small fortune.
Scroll forward 30 years and imagine my surprise when on a business visit to Shell Stanlow I saw bronze tools in use all over the plant.
Any relation to Roy Swan,
3/O with Commons?