Sea Rose FPSO

[j.sabourn]

Every finger a marline spike Ivan ? JS

[j.sabourn]

Heard of years ago of a ship which lost its rod and chain facilities for a while and managed to steer by the therioetical method of a jury rig consisting of the bight of a mooring rope laid out astern. One end of the rope being led up the starboard quarter and the other end to the port quarter and both turned up on alternate barrels of the mooring winch , I.e. one over and one under so one man driving the winch . Managed to steer the ship generally in the right direction until the steering was repaired. This was a 10,000 ton ship as well. JS

[Ivan Cloherty]

Every finger a marline spike Ivan ? JS

Never had any complaints John !

[Ivan Cloherty]

Heard of years ago of a ship which lost its rod and chain facilities for a while and managed to steer by the therioetical method of a jury rig consisting of the bight of a mooring rope laid out astern. One end of the rope being led up the starboard quarter and the other end to the port quarter and both turned up on alternate barrels of the mooring winch , I.e. one over and one under so one man driving the winch . Managed to steer the ship generally in the right direction until the steering was repaired. This was a 10,000 ton ship as well. JS

Never had to resort to the mooring line method John, but have used guntackles from the quadrant in the steering flat up through poop accommodation to mooring winch to up and over drum ends, thank god for snatch blocks. If I recall correctly the ship was 'Samanco' (10,000) long time ago though! 1950's : Happy days

[j.sabourn]

Yes the old lifeboat compass had more uses than being stuck in a lifeboat.Handy down the steering flat once had an approx error phoned down from the bridge and went onto the hand steering on the quadrant itself if fitted . The other use was the testing of the degaussing fitted during the war and still fitted on new buildings for a few years after placing the compass above or below the copper cable and hopefully see the reversal of the ships polarity on same when switched on. Wonder if magnetism is still in the corriculem for various certificates . Cheers JS.

[j.sabourn]

Thank goodness for the old Telemotor system brought to us by the theory of was it Boyle ? Who said liquids are not compressible. Almost true as the gases contained in some liquids are compressible hence the distilled water with a touch of glisteryne to avoid freezing in the system , took out all the hard work of moving that quadrant by brute force Ivan. The only time I ever saw the quadrant and associated pipe work to motors freeze up was in all places Venice one time, boy was it cold . All the times lying alongside in Murmansk never saw this happen. Freed up the system by throwing buckets of hot water on the pipe work. Myself I think someone through sheer ignorance had topped up the system with ordinary tap water. JS
Your reference to the quadrant tackles were a familiar sight on war time and pre war vessels , their title on the ships equipment list was relieving tackles on the ships I was on. Cheers JS
PS Maybe the reason originally as was known on most ships that the description of a good helmsman was to use as little helm as possible to obtain the best results, probably was due to the heavy work involved otherwise originally. And also to cause less noise to the sound of the quadrant clanking round every couple of minutes and causing sleepless off watch periods to those having cabins around the steering flat. JS.

[Ivan Cloherty]

, their title on the ships equipment list was relieving tackles on the ships I was on. Cheers JS
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Usually kept in that mysterious place called the 'tonnage hatch' sometimes along with a spare stream anchor which the derricks at the last cargo hatch could not plumb.

[j.sabourn]

My memorys of such they were kept in the steering flat itself. The tonnage hatch being kept for the loading of Whiskey and other liqueurs , loaded of course by those industrious Glasgow dockers armed with apart from their cargo hooks , tin mugs attached to their belts.A badge of a much used implement. Cheers JS
Needless to say it was soon revealed that the locking bars over the canvas hatch tarpaulin even though locked where they met at the centre of the of the hatch tarp. Could be sprung by a short length of of hollow pipe at the coaming side. This only occurred at sea at night so during the hours of darkness ,the searchlight used to be trained on the hatch to see nobody hurt themselves when using the pipe as a lever. JS