Well done. I was a BT starting 1968 on a Gearing Class destroyer. We preheated the Bunker C to just below the flash point. When changing burner barrels, better make sure you shut off the root valve before shutting off the valve next to the barrel. If not and you bump the quick valve next to the burner barrel, you will get covered with hot bunker C as well as the boiler behind you. What a mess that is. We used JP-5 on the torch for lighting off the boiler as well as cleaning the nozzles. Shore steam is not 600 PSI but it's more than enough to light off a boiler...but......the bilge pump is a reciprocating and it never worked right on shore steam. Like in a comedy movie, you'd be hitting the reversing valve with a wrench to try to keep it going. Pain in the rear. Safety clothes? No safety clothes or gloves on our ship. If you smoked black because you were not paying attention, you'd be getting called from the bridge post haste and they were not asking, "How's it going down there?" Ha Ha If one was not paying attention or could not regulate the steam pressure when changing ship's speed, you'd lift a safety. If I remember correctly the first safety would lift at 625 psi and the second safety would lift at 635 psi. Lifting a safety is not what one wants to do. Testing for leaks after a boiler is taken off line and cleaned is done by water under pressure. It's called a hydro static test. First you lock the safeties so they don't life and pressurize the boiler with about 650 psi of water pressure and look for leaks. I may be a little off on the 650 psi but I remember it was more than 635 psi. You not only looked for leaks but the feed valve was closed and the boiler had to hold that pressure for a set amount of time. If it dropped within that time frame, you have a leak. You DON"T want to test for leaks using steam. Good job explaining how the boilers work. Barry G. Kery
I remember a comment in the trivia and goofs for "In Harm's Way" that they were doing something wrong when starting up the boilers on the destroyer "Cassidy." It had something to do with safeties. I was on a DC party on the Ranger. We ran 1200psi steam. They taught us to wave a 2x4 around to search for pin hole leaks in those lines.
slowly, over the course of many years, through this channel I shall amass the knowledge to single-handedly pull off the heist of the century: steal a battleship out of its own port
Former BT1 here. The red handle on the burner is the SSD, Safety Shut-off Device. It's either On or Off, never throttled. Fuel pressure to the burners is done via a regulator valve to the supply header so all burners of that bank have the same pressure. Also, we called it a Light-Off Torch.
@@otm646 Only one. The burner tip is designed specifically for the boiler and it's exact burner geometry. As pressure increases, more holes are opened, thus allowing more flow. If I remember, ours were VP-19 burner tip devices.
@@tonyb.4824 BTC here, steamed many miles on M type boilers. Sprayer plates are various sizes, the hole is a standard drill size. On the old cans the largest size was a number 29 drill size, so we called it a 29 sprayer plate. On the Midway it was a 11 sprayer plate. A BIG hole. No ship needed external power to light off, we had emergency diesel generators to provide needed power to electric in port fuel pump and a electric light off blower till we got enough steam pressure to open the aux steam stop and provide steam to the mail FDB'S ( forced draft blower) and a steam fuel oil pump. Then bring the steam up to 600 and open the mail steam stop the provide steam to a turbine generator and a main feed pump. Once we got a certain amount of steam flow we would light off the superheated side to raise steam temp from 489 degree saturated steam temp to 850. Also, by 1975 all ships were converted from NFSO ( Navy Special Fuel oil, Black oil ) DFM ( diesel Fuel Marine) THANK GOD!!which is about the same as JP5 so no heating of fuel was required.
The 24-hour emergency method is actually the standard method of bringing the plant online for most steam-powered USN ships, except that shore power is used rather than the Emergency Diesel. While most Navy bases do have steam available on the pier, it is frequently of a purity that engineers are EXTREMELY reluctant to introduce it into the main engineering plant. Commonly, the main plant is isolated and pier steam is directed only to "hotel" services such as galley, laundry, heating, hot water, etc., with the condensate water (condensed steam) dumped to the bilges or designated tankage as applicable. Navy ships are fanatical about water purity in the engineering plant. The Distilled Water found in gallon jugs in the store would most likely fail boiler feed water tests.
Considering most store bought water is really just tap water run through a sand filter, then a sub micron filter, then through an ion exchange column series, and finally through a massive charcoal filter, before a UV steriliser and a final ultrafilter stage just prior to the bottle yes. The same set up is used to do the blend water for both brewing and also for the water used in bottled cool drink, so the plant is a common thing. If you want water that will pass those standards then the only water is the "water for injection" used to make up injectable from powder. That is triple distilled from the water out of the other plant, and bottled at just short of boiling to keep the entire system sterile.
@@SeanBZA Boiler feed doesn't require anything quite THAT drastic, as there is no concern over microbial contamination. It does however need to be chemically pure and free of dissolved gasses. Additives are then added to optimize the water for use in the boilers. Anything off of the evaporators (vacuum distillers) which didn't meet standards was generally more than suitable to be brominated, re-mineralized, and stored as potable water.
Makes sense. Getting the steam out to the pier is a long way from the base's steam plant. Plenty of opportunity to cool down, and become "moist" steam. Very bad stuff.
@@stanbrow Not to mention the fact that all the base uses steam for is heating, and that is the quality which they strive for. When all you are worried about is valves, radiators, and steam traps, you are probably good as long as you let the rust settle out of the condensate before you pump it back into the feed tank for another go....
Sounds like the ultra-filtration setup we had at the university. It didn't steam-distill anything, but the building had a huge RO water deionizer plumbed into each lab. The Nano system used that as feed stock and ran it through multiple ion exchange beds until the dissolved solids were in the parts per billion range. The campus steam plant ran on city water. The RO system had more than enough capacity to feed the boilers but they decided running a pipe to them was more expensive than shutting down and descaling every year.
The little destroyer I served on in the 80's as a Machinist Mate had 4 Babcock & Wilcox D type boilers feeding 2 engines at 1250 psi and 1000 degrees. I loved the work despite the high temps in the engineroom. Thanks for the great videos.
The DLG 7 Luce in 71-74 that I was on used navy distillate oil (basically diesel) or jp 5 in a pinch and while we had gloves I never saw a leather jacket or hearing protection. Which is why I am hearing impaired now and receive disability from VA. That aside with shore steam we always lit off 1 boiler 24 hrs before leaving Port then others eight hours before leaving port. And we still had to use electric auxiliary pumps to get the boiler up to pressure on the first boiler. Also rarely could you start the burner without flopping the air control on and off a few times to get it Lit. I wonder if New Jersey had converted to Navy distillate when they were refitted in the 70s or 80s it was mostly a matter of changing nozzles and cleaning the old oil tanks out. Black oil was nasty to work with, I know that they converted the Luce because we still had the oil heaters,which weren’t mentioned but necessary to bring black oil to its flashpoint.
@@rwklueg I was on the Robison DDG 12. We had heater coils in the fuel tanks but don't recall us ever using them. Our usual cold iron to underway was about 8 hours, usually ran on 2 boilers to make 25 knots. Ship was built in 1959 and I never knew much about the fuel we used except it smelled like old diesel fuel.
We were pretty much the same could have all the boilers will need it online in about eight hours we usually put off one boiler 24 hours ahead just to be sure all systems were normal.
Interesting must have been post WW2 design. Our mill (built in the 1930's) had 600PSI primary steam headers and boilers. Upgrade on the late 50's brought in 1500PSI headers and boilers. Modern generating plants are much higher pressure than that of course.
I'm a former BT, from the mid 60's USS Yorktown CVS10, we never had protective gear. or hearing protection .this video brings back some great memories .. We always said BT's rule the underworld.
I'm a former US Merchant Marine 3rd assistant engineer having worked aboard freighters and tankers and the video is fairly accurate . The greatest fear working in the engine room is too "lose the plant" in which the steam pressure has dropped low enough to cause the steam turbo generators to trip and go off line . Losing power is bad -- no steerage is available, no power for critical pumps and the ship is literally "dead". To handle and manage an emergency like this takes hard work , clear thinking , plus team work with your crew . I have started dead plants using the diesel fuel back up system, I have actually raised steam by removing the boiler burner assembly and feeding wood pallets into the furnace until sufficient steam presssure was raised so that the steam reciprocating fuel and feed water pumps could be used -- its tricky but can be done. Been there , done that !!!!!!
I was on a ship where the online generator tripped (low oil pressure tripped the Governor). The bad part of that was the emergency diesel generator was tagged out for pm. It took awhile to get back online.
I’m a former ships engineer from the Norw. Merchant marine and I have worked in engine rooms on many ships, even as a fire technician on B&W boilers. I’ve tended the boilers and lit the boilers from cold status many times, but our systems were never all steam. We had diesel generators and electric pumps which makes things a lot more flexible. There’s a lot to watch on such boilers, fresh water is produced from seawater - the best drinking water in the world- and fed into the boilers since you will always have to replace what you lose from leaks in the system. Even the quality of the water is watched every day, chemically treated and maintained. To run an engine room takes a lot of skills.
My Dad served on several WW2 era ships like the Ajax, Mispillion, and the Oriskany in the 60 amd 70s. He said it could take up to 2 days to get up steam in bunker oil powered ships. I always loved the sea oil smell on the dock as a kid. It was the smell of adventure to me.
Bunker oil requires heating to lower the viscosity enough to be able to atomize it in the injectors. Feed oil heaters are generally steam. Options are to light off a boiler using a much lighter oil or to use an auxiliary heater (electric) to heat the bunker oil. Firing with a lighter oil results in a much lower heat output per burner, while the electric heaters don't have the capacity to provide heated oil for more than one or two burners. The extra time it takes is partially due to using one of the above methods to fire the one boiler with limited fuel capacity and raise enough steam to preheat the other boilers AND supply the main fuel oil heaters. Once you reach this point, you can start adding full capacity burners using the heated bunker fuel. Newer boilers are designed to use the lighter oil, and can be lit off with main fuel on multiple burners with little or no preheat on the fuel. This allows for a quicker boiler preheat and the ability to add multiple burners for steam generation as soon as the systems are up to operating temp. You can also bring up multiple boilers at the same time.
I'm a former BT that servered on 2 war ships during 1988 - 1994. I loved operating and working in the Boiler Plant. It was great and I made life long friends. It's quite a brotherhood unlike most that anyone can imagine. You did a good job. I actually thought you may have been a BT. Most don't know what the actual parts break down of a burner assembly. You explained that pretty well. There ea few other nuances that we would do to that burner once it was out. We really took a lot of pride in our Plant. It takes a tremendous amount of work to generate that type of cleanly plant. All of us especially when we were underway would clean and do power plant housekeeping. Love it andstill miss it. I hear that the Queen Mary recently opened up their Boiler and machinery rooms for tours.
I am a former crew member who stood watch in all the firerooms in the 80's. We used F76 oil for our boilers. The old heaters were removed because we did not need them to preheat the fuel. The firerooms were equipped with a small electric blower and fuel pump for cold light off. There was also a air driven reciprocating water pump on the lower level to fill the boiler prior to start up in emergency. Otherwise a electric pump was used on start up if all the plants were cold. Once we had a boiler and SSTG online. Steam would be crossed over to other firerooms so we could use the steam driven pumps to start another boiler. My watch station was lower level man.
I'm glad you mentioned the nozzles, I recall a story during the Pearl Harbor attack, the Nevada had to change nozzles before making a run for it, a risky job since a nearby bomb detonation would send a pressure wave down the stack causing flames to blow back out of the opening. The story went that the fireman just finished installing the final nozzle and got out of the way before the fire blew back out of the boiler!
Keeping the dragon (flames) in a boiler is a balancing job between ID and FD fans. Had an upset on a unit once, and a day or so later I received a video showing the blow-back. Looked up the operator that took it to chastise him for hanging around to take it. His reply "I was trapped in a corner with no way out, wanted a record of what happened, if I was not around to tell it". Did BOT chastise him.
Never in my life did I imagine I could find such a great resource of information about battleships. I have visited several in my life, including New Jersey, North Carolina and Massachusetts. Only now do I realize how little I really knew about them at the time. Thank you so much.
my dad served on a Destroyer Escort, a High Speed Transport (converted from a DE on the ways) and a Command and Control Ship (converted from an LST) from Jan 51 until Jan 55 as a PROUD Boiler Technician 3rd Class... im going to show him this video tomorrow. im pretty certain hes going to love it. looks like the conditions in that fire room is much better than in his Tin Cans. average of 130oF and the need to wear gloves when climbing the access ladder into or out of the compartment. thanks for your videos. i LOVE them
One of the most memorable quips from my Uncle (RN Commodore Rtd) "It's a piss poor Captain that can't fire off the boilers on his own ship" Words to live by
LOL, I guess that means I was a piss poor Captain (retired). I was skipper on a number of very large steam ships and I didn’t begin to have the expertise to get the plant up, my Engineers did. I did have a good understanding of the vessels systems and expect my Chief Engineers would have taken a dim view of me micro managing their realm.
Former Machinists Mate 3rd class on the USS Franklin D. Roosevelt (CVA 42) here, served on the FDR from '74 until decomissioning in '77. Stood many, many throttle watches down in #4 Engine Room. I took my job seriously, and tried to learn as much about the boilers as I could, to the point of qualifying as a burnerman in B Division. Had a lot of fun, even served some watches in the boiler rooms. One clear memory I have concerning smoke; there was a watch stationed on the island on the flight deck whose sole job was to monitor the smoke coming from the boilers. If there was smoke, he would notify Main Engineering Control (known simply as Main Control) in the #3 Engine Room and Main Control would relay the info to me over the sound powered phones. "4 engine, the smoke is black". "4 Engine, aye." Then call over to the boiler rooms (each engine had 3 boilers, 2 from each engine were always lit), "Bravo, Charlie, the smoke is black". Back would come the answer, like clockwork: "Bravo's clear, Charlie's clear". Wasn't us boss, that guy up on the island, he must be blind in one eye and can't see out of the other. Yeah, right! Well, one day I got the call and made the call only to hear back "Bravo's clear" and ...nothing. The burnerman in Charlie was new. "Charlie, engine, the smoke is black!". Came the muttered reply "I'm workin' on it!" I didn't say anything, but I heard all the other burnermen really came down on him like a ton of bricks afterward. We laughed about that for a month!!
I was stationed on the Jersey in Fireroom #1. As a fresh boot on the ship, one of my first tasks was to stand smoke watch. At first I thought my leg was being pulled, as in mail buoy watch because of the climb to the O11 level (I believe it was).
I was aboard Rosie in 71 and 72 as a DC. That was about the time that DC's were being changed over to HT's. From what I hear they ended up going back to DC's eventually. Loved Rosie and her bent shaft. We had some interesting times back then. My little brother ended up going Navy and was assigned to the Sylvania. He went to the Dark Side though and became a darn deck ape. While they were in port in Norfolk he got assigned to a work detail to help get all usable stuff from Rosie when they were about to scrap her. He had fond memories of being on her during one of our day cruises that if memories serve me correctly were called "Cub Cruise" where we could take family with us for a day. It's been too long and too many strokes since then to remember all of the details.
The periscopes are an interesting feature. Modern ships use CCTV instead. The cruise ships I worked on also had smoke density monitors, which basically had a light source at one side of the funnel and a sensor at the other side to actually measure and record smoke density, particularly in Alaska, where we had to comply with local regulations on smoke emissions. (This was a diesel- electric ship of course but we had steam boilers for heating.)
As a former Rosie sailor, B div officer and EEOW in Main Engines Control (located in #3 Engine Room...I appreciated your above recollection. Rosie had undersized forced draft blowers which made her smoke black a lot..a no, no for recovering aircraft. They also wiped bearings frequently because they had to run faster for longer periods. I was on board from 1963-1965,,,no protective clothing or ear protection then...as a result the VA considers me 10% disabled and furnishes me with hearing aides. Nasty.
Not bad. I could tell that you haven't been fortunate enough to operate these amazing plants. I was/am a boiler technician BT in the Navy I served on 2 steam ships on the late 80s/early 90s. My buddy was a BT on the Mighty Mo
I was a boiler tech on the uss forrestal. When you insert the torch you start counting if it doesn't take off I believe it was 3 seconds. You remove the torch and start to purge to get any raw fuel on the deck of the boiler evaporated. It's really an amazing thing lighting of these huge boilers. I did it probably 2 or 300 times. We had 2 600 psi Babcock and Wilcox boilers in our main space. It truly was an amazing thing. Very very hot in the main space. It's been over 30 years so I forgot alot of the technical terms. But you did a fine job explaining the process. Thanks for the video. It brought back some good memories
Some 50 years ago as a teenager I sketched out my first battleship. Today I realise just how incredibly complex there ships really are. Thank you so much for this!
Not bad. BT3 86-93 CV43 was my first ship with the M-Type dual furnace. There was a "Micrometer valve" which was controlled by the burnerman that allowed you to throttle fuel pressure from 50-350 psi evenly to all burners in operation to maintain 600psi drum pressure at 469° then a portion of that would pass over to the superheated bank to get heated to 850° for the main engine turbans. One drop of water in a turban, well you might as well through in a handful of nuts and bolts at it at 1000+ rpm's. Enjoying a frosty beverage your videos! Keep up the good work Shipmate!
As a retired Chief Boiler Tender (1956-1976, seventeen years sea duty) I suggest you make this video over again. First off, Bunker C is a civilian term. The Navy from WW2 through the early sixties used a semi refined black oil called NSFO or Naval Special Fuel Oil. It was a cut above Bunker C, probably with the lumps filtered out. In the mid sixties we started shifting all steam powered ships to distillate or #2 diesel oil. Just about all ships were converted by the mid seventies. I personally supervised the conversion of 3 destroyers. As for safety gear; it was totally non existent. Every BT I worked with had burn scars, smashed fingers and hearing loss. And now I'm signing law firm affidavits for the families of former 'Snipes' my shipmates and friends who are dying of mesothelioma. I'll quit here before it turns into a rant.
"As for safety gear; it was totally non existent." I'm not saying you're wrong but there is this video from Bataan which shows exactly what Ryan shows in this video with the addition of a flash hood: th-cam.com/video/f4ESNc4tLoc/w-d-xo.html&pp=ygUPbGlnaHRpbmcgYm9pbGVy The first comment on that video is from someone who claims to have been a sailor in the 80's who says he used the same equipment. Perhaps there was a change in what was acceptable from a safety perspective after you separated.
In the late 1980's I decommissioned the USS Norton Sound AVM-1 which was produced late in 1944 as a seaplane tender. After the war it was used to test and evaluate weapons systems eventually ending with Tomahawk Vertical launch and Aegis radar the premier fire control system we have now. This ship was the last in our Navy which used black fuel oil for fuel. When we got low on gas they had to have a tanker truck come up from Mexico to refuel us since none of our refineries produced this thick oil. When I was qualifying for Surface Warfare (SW) I stood some watches in the engine room. We used 400 pound steam. The engineer on watch had a bunch of keys they wore around their neck. One of those keys opened the box that had the nozzles which were used only when full top speed was ordered. I remember looking through the periscopes. Topside there was a watch stander that sole purpose was to watch the stack gasses and report if they were producing smoke. This was a game that was played between the engineers and the bridge watch standers to who could spot "making smoke" before the other did. It was a matter of pride not to have an outside non-snipe person tell engineering they weren't doing their job.
Pretty good with only one big error. The orange levers on the burners were described as being able to vary the amount of fuel entering the furnace. Actually these are "on" or "off" internal valves for the fuel flow to the burner barrel. The fuel was modulated with more or less pressure to a fuel oil header/pipe that fed all of the burners. Actual modulation of fuel pressure was accomplished with a "Mic" valve which was located at the inlet side of the fuel oil header and fed from the fuel oil service pumps at a constant pressure. The M type boiler had a saturated side furnace and a superheater side furnace - each with its own arrangement of burner assemblies. Fuel oil supply pressure was independent so there were two "Mic" valves - one for each furnace. Other small items were: 1. I never saw steam supplied from shore for a cold-iron light off. We would pull an air casing panel off the boiler at the generating bank side, close all hatches to the fireroom, and put the air supply on high - this pressurized the space and the air had to flow through the air casing to the furnace and up the stack to get out of the space. Hope this was of some interest. BTCM/SGPI BC Reeves USN/ret 1966-1988.
Fun fact boilers have to be greased. Boilers expand and contract with heating and cooling. They have what’s called sliding feet that are required to be greased monthly.
I'm a former MM, docent on the USS Turner Joy, and a part time member of TJ's maintenance crew. Our only open fire room is one of my favorite spaces. I enjoy explaining the steam cycle to visitors. Aboard the TJ we have 4 Babock and Wilcox D-type boilers that pumped out 1,200 PSI steam at 975 degrees. This video makes me want to get to know the boilers on mine even more. I know their operation quite well, but there's much more I can learn.
Between this video and the training videos posted by the USS Joseph P Kennedy Museum I'm able to go into much more detail when taking people through the Turner Joy's boiler room, but I keep it simple enough and interactive. I already knew a bit thanks to my background, but these videos have proven to be a great refresher. Thank you.
I've seen and read pretty much everything about battleship technology for decades, but this rates among the top 10 most interesting. I've always known that rising steam was a complicated and lengthy process, but how and why has been a "black box". But here I got quite an insight in just 8 minuttes! Bravo!
Some ships have one or more Auxilliary or Donkey Boiler(s) that you start first, then use the steam from the donkey to run the things the main boiler needs such as steam fuel atomization/burner or draft fans until the main boilers build up steam. Typical Donkey Boilers are vertical fire tube(VFT) boilers.
As we get older, our memory of the things back then is a bit kinder than it actually was at the time... We forget the long hours, lack of sleep, crappy pay, crappy food, and officers and CPOs who were on power trips and thought that by making your life miserable, it gave their lives more meaning... :) I'm pretty sure that my memory of my time 40+ years ago is a lot better than it really was at the time, otherwise, I probably would have stayed in...
@@jakeblanton6853 knowing now what I didn’t know then, you can have this modern world. Things were so much simple then. Let’s see you travel the world nowadays like we did back then? I’d go back in a minute SIR
@@bustergutz231 -- Well, it was definitely more fun hitting port back then than these days on cruise ships (even before this COVID-19 nonsense). We were in ports for a couple of days and as such we could stay out all night if we wanted. Cruise ships typically leave port while it is still daylight. Plus, we got to hit the sleazier ports which was a lot more fun when you are single, especially since back then any disease you might catch was curable by penicillin... :) Being single these days with disease that will kill you kind of takes the fun out of the single scene... Kind of like playing Russian Roulette with a M1911... The cruise ships definitely have better food than we had back then though and the staterooms, although small, are better than even most of the officers had aboard even the largest ships, much less the berthing compartments that us enlisted swine had... :) I'll admit that I would like to be able to go back to that time knowing what I know now... I would like to think that I would have made a few less mistakes and might even have ended up with a few less broken bones over the years, but the fact is, those bad experiences are what have made us into the type of person that we are today... I did my time and dropped back into college after I got out, picking up a couple of degrees (and a wife) along the way and ended up being pretty somewhat successful during my career. Enough so that I was able to retire a few years ago with paid off houses, vehicles, and around $2.3M invested in stocks (despite some spectacularly bad choices like GM and Enron)... I don't think I would want to be part of the military these days since it has become too damn politically correct... I spent all of January 2019 in SE Asia (Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore, Vietnam, Thailand, Cambodia), some it on a cruise and some just traveling by air and land... Yeah, definitely the wrong time to be visiting that area thanks to the WuFlu (which my wife and I caught on the last week of the trip)... I can travel the world these days and not have to possibly spend months "haze gray and underway" to do it... When I go out of the country these days, I usually limit myself to a month long trip, sometimes a bit longer... Thanks to AirBnB, I can stay at places that have more "local color" and not just an international hotel all the time... I rent a car while overseas and just drive around, just seeing what I can find instead of going to the typical tourist sights. And, of course, our music was definitely better back then than the crap that they have these days... Although there was that one particularly nasty period when "disco" came about that kind of a low point in our musical legacy... :)
@@jakeblanton6853 well sir let’s just say that our views on life differ somewhat greatly.I still prefer the simple things in life. This modern technology that you seem to put much trust into is going to Bite you in the ass. But hey, there’s a seat for every ass. God Bless my friend
The Knox class FF's I served on has 1200psi plants. I had buddies who were BT's. They invited me to tour the boiler space. Very impressive and very hot. I preferred to stay up in the CIC. It was air conditioned and didn't have the potential of 1200 PSI steam leaks!
I was Burnerman for number 1 boiler on the USS Frank Cable. This piece is spot on for boilers.. except we didn't have different sized atomizers, but adjusted fuel pressure for that effect. Once, my gloves burst into flame changing a burner barrel. Shook them off, stomped them out, put them back on and got back to work. Love what you're doing. Keep it up!
Glad to see the videos rise in quality, and that the new equipment is working for you. I'm a Jersey Boy who left the Garden State for better pastures but I will always love the USS New Jersey. Thank you for keeping her alive.
BT2, 77-81. Brings back quite a few memories. USS Worden CG-18 (78-80) and USS Camden AOE-2 (80-81). Being a BT was a great job, it was the start I needed back then to get me where I'm at today. Will always remember those days.
Thanks so much for this video. My uncle, Joe Flynn, was a fireman aboard USS Wichita. I've been searching for more information on the Babcock & Wilcox boilers...what they look like, how they work.
Consider this, the engineering spaces of a warship contain hundreds of valves and thousands of feet of piping. When you qualified to stand watch in a particular station you had to know every valve on that station and if you changed the position of a specific valve how it effected the overall plant. You had to be able to think fast on your feet if you had problems. I can still remember a lot of valve lineups from a whole lot of ships. MM1(SS/SW) Retired
It's not just limited to the piping, but even the wires and cables for things from lights and telephones, to the fire control systems that can be maned from multiple different locations. They are astoundingly complex.
Retired 21 year active duty BT here. I served on ships built from the early 60’s to my last built in 1998. None of these required steam in order to lite-off the boilers. From a cold start to full pressure 600-1200 psi would take between 4-6 hours.
Nice job! I was at BT on the destroyer Rogers 876 from 68-72. I cleaned many times the boilers. Fireside’s they called it where you went and watersides inside the mud drum. I was an Oil King for the ship the last year and tested boiler and drinking water along with testing oil transferred to us.
Love that “protective gloves” “leather jacket” while lighting off. Never happened on the ships I steamed. The fuel was not bunker c, it was NSFO, Navy Special Fuel Oil. Just a step above bunker c. On my first ship our fuel pumps would not produce enough fuel pressure when running on shore steam. We had a hand cranked fuel pump for lighting off from cold iron status until we built up to 150 psig, enough to run a fuel oil pump and a forced draft blower.
Much of the time spent to get boilers operational was gradually heating up the furnace brick work and boiler tubes. Water circulation in the boiler tubes is essentially zero. Low heat is needed to start circulation to prevent tube damage. Boiler drum and superheater vents have to be open to purge O2 from boiler water and to allow room for water to be pumped in. Old timers said once upon a time wood fires were first built in the furnace to keep initial heat intensity down before opening oil burners.
I'm an engineer at a large urban hospital. For many, many years we burned #6 fuel oil in our boilers, which are Babcock-Wilcox D-types. While our light off procedure is a little bit different, we still had the same fuel guns, except ours were longer and had a slightly different style atomizer. We would change our guns once every 8 hours and clean them up, so I'm very familiar with that routine. Great video.
Me too although not B&Ws we burned #6 in our D-type water tube Cleaver Brooks since 1970 been there 33 years myself just decomming them now for new CB firetubes.jim 2nd Eng.
@@TheShawna1 The old hospital, which was torn down in the early 70s, had old CB's. Old timers used to tell me how those were sometimes a handful to deal with. They'd tell me that when one of those boilers took a notion to be a pain in the neck to run, it would take a bit of work to get it running right, otherwise they were very very reliable.
@@tsm688 We changed them to keep the boilers running efficiently and prevent buildup in the atomizers. We had a good crew here and it was no trouble to get the job done in 5 minutes, including re-light. It all sounds terribly complicated but if a man had two functioning brain cells in his head and followed a straightforward procedure, he could get the hang of things very quickly.
On Essex class carriers during the Vietnam era we had the same basic equipment (8 Babcock and Wilcox M type boilers in 4 firerooms, 600 psi @750F) but there was no safety equipment like a helmet or leather jacket. these must have been improvements made between the my era and the 80's. Also that red lever that you used to let in the fuel oil was just a needle valve with a "faucet type" handle. Your narrative states that there are nine burners with five on the "saturated side" and five on the "superheated side," really just four on the "superheated side." The color scheme looks correct, it takes me back in time for sure. I was on the USS Hancock (CVA-19), we sailed side by side with the New Jersey on Christmas morning 1968 when Bob Hope transferred from our ship to the New Jersey about ~10am. At 8am that morning we were within the "+12 nautical mile limit" of the territorial waters. I think I've called out our position correctly, anyway, this is in reference to Agent Orange caused diseases. I would be interested in whether or not the New Jersey had qualified and if any of your interviewees had any claims with the VA for Agent Orange related diseases, i.e. the service connected diseases.
Thank you Ryan, and all the great comments on these very interesting videos........ Best stuff on You Tube I’ve seen in a while........ Also thank you Vet’s🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸
I can't imagine how hot it was for the boiler techs or how loud it must have been to be in the blower and turbine rooms. It surprises me that men dealt with such hardships on a daily basis while at war and under threat of being sent to the bottom with little to no chance of escape. Much respect for the engineers and techs who had to do this for their whole careers.
Ex BT2 Top Watch on CV-59 USS Forrestal 3MMR. We had “D” type 600psi. 4x65,000hp main engines. The fun started when they launch aircraft and up to a million horsepower of steam had to be replaced in the accumulators in about a minute.
I was not a very good kid. I had model of the New Jersey and I loved it...Loved to play with it too much too. I love our Navy and I really appreciate all the work the crews of these museum ships do. I'm land locked so it's not very economical for me to visit them but I'm glad they're there.
was a b.t. on the uss roanoke 78-82 aux. pump man never had the pleasure of a burner man and we had a control station for air and gas. thanks for the video!
Thanks for this video. I was a HT but spent as much time as possible in the fire room of the USS Simon Lake. I did get to light off a burner several times - in full protective gear.
Your No.1 burner has its flange shielding intact (the tinfoil looking material wrapped around the fuel oil inlet flange....last flange before the burner assembly). However, the other numbered burners seem to be lacking complete flange shields. This would be a major safety violation and would prevent lighting off the boiler until they were properly in place. I am a BT1(sw) USN ret. Steamed FF1078 class frigate, USS Joseph Hewes/USS Cape Cod AD-43/USS Lynde McCormick DDG-8 and USS New Orleans LPH-11. Combustion Engineering 1200lb'rs Babcock & Wilcox 1200lb'rs and 600lb'rs on the tender and gator freighter. Glad to answer BT questions.
My grandfather served on the new jersey during the korean war as a BT1 , looking forward to visiting the ship with my son sometime this year to show him where his great grandfather served
What I like most about these is they show things I didn't even think of. You just light like the boiler at home, No not at all. More like the furnace's at work :D
Had an older friend that started as an ensign on an old Fletcher class. For some reason they sent him to chip rust in the bilge. He chipped a quarter inch hole through the bottom of the hull, and had trouble sleeping the rest of the deployment.
I'm really enjoying these videos, my dad took me to see loads of ships when I was a kid, HMS Belfast, HMS Victory, Mary Rose, cutty sark, ss Great Britain, I loved it but my daughter hates it unfortunately, she agreed to a weekend to go and see Mary Rose and then the pandemic put paid to that one. I will get over their to visit one day, keep up the good work.
On more modern USN steam powered ships we have stack gas analyzers with a digital readout that would let you know the condition of your exhaust. Additionally during boiler lite-off we would have a watchstander topside with sound powered phone headsets that would monitor the stack. The reason for this is during extreme white or black smoke conditions there will unburned atomized fuel in the smoke which can cause an explosion.
Were are the periscopes on a Nimitz class carrier? In the reactor compartment walls. Leaded glass periscopes to allow viewing into the compartment for visual inspections.
Another great video. Thanks Ryan. Now we need an in depth discussion about the fuel pudding you reference at 2:20. And all these years I thought the USN was driving up the price of the green diesel I put in my Ford Powerstroke
Through put on the sprayers is also controlled somewhat by the size of the hole in the orrifice. The bigger the hole the more oil can get into the furnace. On the old Admiralty three drum boilers used by the allies behind the nozzle is a swirl plate this causes the oil to come out of the nozzle with a spiral movement. This allows for better mixing hence better combustion. The way the periscope work or in our case we used to call them smoke mirrors. Principle of operation is the same, light source is at the back of the boiler usually just a lamp, you look up into the mirror for the light, if you could see it then no smoke is going up the uptakes. If the fuel air ratio is upset smoke is generated and this blocks the light source. hence can then tell by the absence of light how much smoke you are making.
I was a cook on an aircraft carrier... First... Our boiler rooms were not that clean. Yours is almost as clean as our galley and a bit cleaner than our bakery. Next, I am sure that we used fire tube boilers rather than water-tube boilers. On board Constellation our boilers looked just about the same as the stationary boilers found in buildings. That is to say, the old coal boilers in our monastery were bigger than your battleship boilers, albeit we have not run such high pressures, and our max pressure was about 125 from back in the days when we generated electricity for the town. But that ended when people found out about AC current. Ach... we recently got a new gas powered boiler (and if my servers were working I'd show it to you) it is much smaller that the coal/oil/gas boilers that we used to run, but puts out way more horsepower. We went back to coal when coal was cheaper, today gas is cheaper so hence the new boiler. Some of the fittings had to be removed to get it into the boiler room, and we did have to remove the boiler room doors as well. Fortunately Drachinifel gave a great course on water-tube boilers. When I was on board the Jersey a summer or two ago I was able to look into the boiler room from Broadway and wondered about its tiny size. It did not measure up to the boilers on a carrier! : )
There really isn't a considerable size difference in these boilers, you just can't really see the boilers very well in this video because the thing is so big, there is a platform deck in the middle of it and a bulkhead only 8 feet away from it so you just can't really see the whole thing.
The boiler manual specifically called out using a zippo. One reason is Bic/butane lighters used to be technically banned from the engineering spaces due to their(alleged) ability to rupture in your pocket. (I can affirm that one will eventually "pop" if you leave it on top of the main steam line prior to light-off). Not really a good idea to be monkeying around in a really hot space with a bottle of flammable pressurized fluid in your pocket. Pro tip- Smoke color has a lot more to do with not blowing the face off the boiler than you might suppose. The smoke is used as an indication on how rich/lean the combustion is. Extended running in either condition can lead to some unwanted outcomes like the entire watch team getting parboiled.
Had a butane torch lighter that over heated inside my car. When I went to light a cigar I wound up with a softball sized fireball right in front of me. 2nd degree burns to my right cheek and back of left hand.
I actually work as a engineer in a company that produces industrial burners. The tech has gone a long way but it's still similar enough. Some part do not change the atomizer the viewport, but now we have everything wired up. Sercos instead of handles :)
I'm not a former boiler tech however, adjusting the smoke from thick black to thin white is similar to using a offset wood smoker. You have to adjust the air to fuel ratio to obtain an optimum thin blue smoke for an even smoke. Interesting how they are similar. I also remember watching a vid on another YT channel on how they light the steam boilers. Thanks for sharing and Happy New Year Ryan!!
I’m not sure of how much nor how quickly steam load on BB would fluctuate. I do know that the cats on CV would necessitate cutting burners in and out, resulting in quite a little choreography amongst BTs that I as MM, could only watch in awe. We had our own little dances. Good men all.
@@LexieAssassin I've been wanting the same thing. It was learning about how all the fire control/gun directors work that made me realize how cheap World of Warships is.
A Little known fact is that if no auxiliary generators are available for a cold start, you can always get the Admiral and other senior rates to go down to the Engine Room. There, they will generate enough Hot Air to warm the Fuel Oil and get the process started.
Happy 2021 to yourself and all connected with the safekeeping of BB-62! More engine room/boiler room vids please :) We never used shore-side steam when starting up from cold in drydock. We'd fire the boiler with gas oil, adding load to the boiler gradually - feed pump first, then bunker C oil pre-heaters, then turbo-alternators. Once fully established, the superheater vent was closed, and the second boiler fired up. Interesting that the superheaters on New Jersey have their own burners. With us, the saturated steam emerged from the top of the steam drum ( Foster Wheeler ESD-3 boilers ) then passed through superheater tubes next to the furnace - no additional burners fitted.
The second side wasn't just superheater. It had water tubes on that side too. The superheater was near the furnace, but still had a water tube screen in front of it. After the superheater there would be water tubes and finally feedwater heating. The need for separating the superheater to only one side was related to the fact that warships spend much of their life at a small fraction of full power. Since speed is related to the cube of the power, cruising at half speed only is 1/8 power! Over such a wide range of power levels, a conventional boiler would have a huge drop in outlet temperature. By putting all of the superheater on one side, adjusting the fuel between the two sides could adjust the superheat. At light load, the superheater side would be turned down far more to limit the superheat to a safe value.
@@matthewbeasley7765 Thanks for the explanation. As you probably guessed, I was speaking from the perspective of a merchant ship, and so it's an education to see and hear how the steam plant differed on a particular type of warship. One day I'll get over there and have a look round myself! Thanks again. :)
I was an MM3 on the USS Monongahela and that ships boilers had 2 burners on the top and were lit off electrically and we burned jp5 because it burned cleaner than dfm which minimized soot build up on the tubes. Thanks for the video! I'd like to see one from the engine room.
Boiler feed water is very pure distilled water with some special additives to inhibit corrosion. You are not heating distilled water, nor do you have somebody taking and analyzing water and fuel samples every hour. Speaking towards your hot water heater, you probably have hard water. You need to completely flush your hot water heater at least once per year to get rid of the sediment created when you heat mineralized water. Shut of the power (or gas), hook a garden hose to the drain valve down at the bottom, turn it on, and let the water run until you no longer see particles coming out. This will be easier if you drain the tank, remove that cheap plastic drain valve, and replace it with a 1/4 turn full-flow ball valve. BEFORE you turn the power back on, purge all air out of the tank by running all of the hot water faucets until no air is present. Turn the power on with air in the tank and we will be discussing how to replace an element. You might consider a water softener. You are probably also replacing dishwashers, washing machine solenoid valves, sink faucets, toilet tank valves, and coffee pots on a regular basis as well.
@@kevincrosby1760 I was going to reply, "but I have a water softener".... but then you were overly nice and went on with advice. I have well water, 500 feet from the Chesapeake Bay, across the river from the old Beth Steel plant. We have so much iron in the ground our blood cells clang when they bump into each other. It's a on going battle with iron out salt pellets and flushes. I really think a gas WH would be better but the whole house is electric so.... tks
@@finscreenname So lucky I guess to have soft water, so soft that it will strip the zinc out of brass fittings. Also you can use it out of the tap to drink, nothing else required. Only reason I have water filters is because half the piping is either century old asbestos or iron in the supply system, and the reservoirs are not exactly silt free. Takes a year for them to go light brown.
@@SeanBZA Ours will mess up some fixtures also even with the softener. Especially the cheaper ones. We moved here because of the water 500 feet down the street, not what's in the ground so we have adapted. 😁
@@finscreenname I try to assume that others may be having the same issues, and might find the advice helpful. I do feel your pain. If my water were any harder, I would need to shovel it into the sink. Iron content is high enough that you can clearly see every place a faucet was allowed to drip over the years. Filters are sitting on floor. Water softener will be ordered Monday when Stimulus posts to account. Been dealing with this for almost 6 years. After the filters and softener are done, I have several hundred feet of Pex to start installing.
That was great to see Ryan, My father and Uncle were B.T. On the Uss Missouri. All he ever told me was he was a BT. So seeing this video now I have a small idea of what his duties were. He passed in 2003 and being his ship is in Pearl Harbor I will never get to see it. Would love to come aboard Jersey just to see 3 areas if it is possible to be brought there.. the old type bunks the boiler room where you just showed and the brig. Yea he told me he spent some time in there also LOL . But thanks for the videos and and congrats on your new job aboard the New Jersey
The fact that the ship had 850F, 600PSI running all over to power things is a gently terrifying thought. One packing lets go on a valve and you probably have a jet that has the same effect on flesh as a light saber.
You search for steam leaks with a broom. Leak sounds like a train; hold the broom well in front of you and wave it around the pipe or valve. Broomstick gets cut in half...you've found the leak! Note: For everything outside the actual engineering spaces (galley, laundry, space heat, etc.) the pressure was reduced to 150 or even 50 psi.
They are 600 pound Babcock and Wilcox boilers. I had an engineer tell me during the war, they bought up steam using a wood fire in the firebox. It took a while, then steam started to heat up heavy fuel oil in the settlers and storage tanks. Finally they got one turbo generator in service and switched to using diesel to come up to 600 pounds. Finally, when fuel oil is about 200-225 it can fire a boiler. I was a boiler tech striker in the service ( Coast Guard ) Then I sailed as a fireman watertender on an old U S Lines freighter. Then sailed as an oiler for Lykes Brothers Steamship. Then I moved on to being an electrician.
Brian your light off procedure just caused a furnace explosion. Before you admit oil to the burner you must add air to the burner. I ran 2 m type boilers on the USS Springfield CLG7, from 1968 to1970 left the navy as BT1 became a boiler inspetor for 39 years.
Someone earlier mentioned the boiler sliding feet--old story of a ship that kept wiping the spring bearings(main shaft support bearings) They couldn't figure it out so they brought in an old salt who wanted to see the sliding feet on the boiler. Sure enough the sliding feet had not been maintained and was actually warping the hull of the ship, causing the spring bearing problems. Greasing the sliding feet was always a critical PMS check
You'd be surprised at how many 'professional speakers' that turn their head away from the mic and keep on talking as if we can hear them. Ryan's much better than them by a wide berth.
Well done. I was a BT starting 1968 on a Gearing Class destroyer. We preheated the Bunker C to just below the flash point.
When changing burner barrels, better make sure you shut off the root valve before shutting off the valve next to the barrel. If not and you bump the quick valve next to the burner barrel, you will get covered with hot bunker C as well as the boiler behind you. What a mess that is.
We used JP-5 on the torch for lighting off the boiler as well as cleaning the nozzles.
Shore steam is not 600 PSI but it's more than enough to light off a boiler...but......the bilge pump is a reciprocating and it never worked right on shore steam. Like in a comedy movie, you'd be hitting the reversing valve with a wrench to try to keep it going. Pain in the rear.
Safety clothes? No safety clothes or gloves on our ship.
If you smoked black because you were not paying attention, you'd be getting called from the bridge post haste and they were not asking, "How's it going down there?" Ha Ha
If one was not paying attention or could not regulate the steam pressure when changing ship's speed, you'd lift a safety. If I remember correctly the first safety would lift at 625 psi and the second safety would lift at 635 psi. Lifting a safety is not what one wants to do.
Testing for leaks after a boiler is taken off line and cleaned is done by water under pressure. It's called a hydro static test.
First you lock the safeties so they don't life and pressurize the boiler with about 650 psi of water pressure and look for leaks.
I may be a little off on the 650 psi but I remember it was more than 635 psi. You not only looked for leaks but the feed valve was closed and the boiler had to hold that pressure for a set amount of time. If it dropped within that time frame, you have a leak. You DON"T want to test for leaks using steam.
Good job explaining how the boilers work.
Barry G. Kery
Thank You for your service !
Was on dd830 70 to 72 got out of forward boiler to A gang 😕
On throttles I lifted safety on man overboard slow up speed up bts wanted to know who's the he'll on throttles
I remember a comment in the trivia and goofs for "In Harm's Way" that they were doing something wrong when starting up the boilers on the destroyer "Cassidy." It had something to do with safeties.
I was on a DC party on the Ranger. We ran 1200psi steam. They taught us to wave a 2x4 around to search for pin hole leaks in those lines.
@@bobberger918 ...and I am sure that the EOOW calmly and quietly asked you to please watch your steam pressure when making throttle adjustments...
slowly, over the course of many years, through this channel I shall amass the knowledge to single-handedly pull off the heist of the century: steal a battleship out of its own port
and destroy the aliens... or wait we're not allowed to watch Battleship are we.
HAHAHA Nice!! I’d Help man the NAV and Radar! DAMN the port police full speed ahead! 🤠
Imagine coming into work as a security guard for the New Jersey (or any other battleship) and seeing the ship steaming out of port 😂
It is a running joke amongst the crew!
I think the amount of fuel oil you'd need to load, plus the water inlets being welded over might put paid to that.
The clip-on mic is such a nice upgrade!
YES!!! 100%
Absolutely.
But the video still has the cameraman's heavy breathing and to be honest it's distracting.
Former BT1 here. The red handle on the burner is the SSD, Safety Shut-off Device. It's either On or Off, never throttled. Fuel pressure to the burners is done via a regulator valve to the supply header so all burners of that bank have the same pressure.
Also, we called it a Light-Off Torch.
So for each selected nozzle diameter you have a range of fuel flow rates based on regulator pressure? How many nozzle diameters are there?
@@otm646 Only one. The burner tip is designed specifically for the boiler and it's exact burner geometry. As pressure increases, more holes are opened, thus allowing more flow. If I remember, ours were VP-19 burner tip devices.
@@tonyb.4824 BTC here, steamed many miles on M type boilers. Sprayer plates are various sizes, the hole is a standard drill size. On the old cans the largest size was a number 29 drill size, so we called it a 29 sprayer plate.
On the Midway it was a 11 sprayer plate. A BIG hole.
No ship needed external power to light off, we had emergency diesel generators to provide needed power to electric in port fuel pump and a electric light off blower till we got enough steam pressure to open the aux steam stop
and provide steam to the mail FDB'S ( forced draft blower) and a steam fuel oil pump. Then bring the steam up to 600 and open the mail steam stop the provide steam to a turbine generator and a main feed pump.
Once we got a certain amount of steam flow we would light off the superheated side to raise steam temp from 489 degree saturated steam temp to 850.
Also, by 1975 all ships were converted from NFSO ( Navy Special Fuel oil, Black oil ) DFM ( diesel Fuel Marine) THANK GOD!!which is about the same as JP5 so no heating of fuel was required.
@@johnchilds6471 ...and it was always your dirty condensate, NOT my salinity Cells which was causing the alarms... :) Former IC2
@@kevincrosby1760 FWDCT dirty, I know. But that cell was usually deep in the bilges and it was fun getting you guys dirty!! :>)
The 24-hour emergency method is actually the standard method of bringing the plant online for most steam-powered USN ships, except that shore power is used rather than the Emergency Diesel. While most Navy bases do have steam available on the pier, it is frequently of a purity that engineers are EXTREMELY reluctant to introduce it into the main engineering plant. Commonly, the main plant is isolated and pier steam is directed only to "hotel" services such as galley, laundry, heating, hot water, etc., with the condensate water (condensed steam) dumped to the bilges or designated tankage as applicable. Navy ships are fanatical about water purity in the engineering plant. The Distilled Water found in gallon jugs in the store would most likely fail boiler feed water tests.
Considering most store bought water is really just tap water run through a sand filter, then a sub micron filter, then through an ion exchange column series, and finally through a massive charcoal filter, before a UV steriliser and a final ultrafilter stage just prior to the bottle yes. The same set up is used to do the blend water for both brewing and also for the water used in bottled cool drink, so the plant is a common thing. If you want water that will pass those standards then the only water is the "water for injection" used to make up injectable from powder. That is triple distilled from the water out of the other plant, and bottled at just short of boiling to keep the entire system sterile.
@@SeanBZA Boiler feed doesn't require anything quite THAT drastic, as there is no concern over microbial contamination. It does however need to be chemically pure and free of dissolved gasses. Additives are then added to optimize the water for use in the boilers.
Anything off of the evaporators (vacuum distillers) which didn't meet standards was generally more than suitable to be brominated, re-mineralized, and stored as potable water.
Makes sense. Getting the steam out to the pier is a long way from the base's steam plant. Plenty of opportunity to cool down, and become "moist" steam. Very bad stuff.
@@stanbrow Not to mention the fact that all the base uses steam for is heating, and that is the quality which they strive for. When all you are worried about is valves, radiators, and steam traps, you are probably good as long as you let the rust settle out of the condensate before you pump it back into the feed tank for another go....
Sounds like the ultra-filtration setup we had at the university. It didn't steam-distill anything, but the building had a huge RO water deionizer plumbed into each lab. The Nano system used that as feed stock and ran it through multiple ion exchange beds until the dissolved solids were in the parts per billion range.
The campus steam plant ran on city water. The RO system had more than enough capacity to feed the boilers but they decided running a pipe to them was more expensive than shutting down and descaling every year.
The little destroyer I served on in the 80's as a Machinist Mate had 4 Babcock & Wilcox D type boilers feeding 2 engines at 1250 psi and 1000 degrees. I loved the work despite the high temps in the engineroom. Thanks for the great videos.
The DLG 7 Luce in 71-74 that I was on used navy distillate oil (basically diesel) or jp 5 in a pinch and while we had gloves I never saw a leather jacket or hearing protection. Which is why I am hearing impaired now and receive disability from VA. That aside with shore steam we always lit off 1 boiler 24 hrs before leaving Port then others eight hours before leaving port. And we still had to use electric auxiliary pumps to get the boiler up to pressure on the first boiler. Also rarely could you start the burner without flopping the air control on and off a few times to get it Lit. I wonder if New Jersey had converted to Navy distillate when they were refitted in the 70s or 80s it was mostly a matter of changing nozzles and cleaning the old oil tanks out. Black oil was nasty to work with, I know that they converted the Luce because we still had the oil heaters,which weren’t mentioned but necessary to bring black oil to its flashpoint.
@@rwklueg I was on the Robison DDG 12. We had heater coils in the fuel tanks but don't recall us ever using them. Our usual cold iron to underway was about 8 hours, usually ran on 2 boilers to make 25 knots. Ship was built in 1959 and I never knew much about the fuel we used except it smelled like old diesel fuel.
We were pretty much the same could have all the boilers will need it online in about eight hours we usually put off one boiler 24 hours ahead just to be sure all systems were normal.
Interesting must have been post WW2 design. Our mill (built in the 1930's) had 600PSI primary steam headers and boilers. Upgrade on the late 50's brought in 1500PSI headers and boilers. Modern generating plants are much higher pressure than that of course.
@@stanbrow Built in 1959, 1250 psi plant.
I'm a former BT, from the mid 60's USS Yorktown CVS10, we never had protective gear. or hearing protection .this video brings back some great memories .. We always said BT's rule the underworld.
Anyone send a new guy down to get a BT punch?
@@Sabactus Buffer Tech? BT was merged into MM in the 90's
@@Sabactus Yep, us "Twidgets" often did. & perhaps a bucket of steam. Lol.
my fiance and I went to go see the yorktown recently. Have you ever been back aboard now that its a museum?
For real. From such a famous ship. Fantastic, sir!
I'm a former US Merchant Marine 3rd assistant engineer having worked aboard freighters and tankers and the video is fairly accurate . The greatest fear working in the engine room is too "lose the plant" in which the steam pressure has dropped low enough to cause the steam turbo generators to trip and go off line . Losing power is bad -- no steerage is available, no power for critical pumps and the ship is literally "dead". To handle and manage an emergency like this takes hard work , clear thinking , plus team work with your crew . I have started dead plants using the diesel fuel back up system, I have actually raised steam by removing the boiler burner assembly and feeding wood pallets into the furnace until sufficient steam presssure was raised so that the steam reciprocating fuel and feed water pumps could be used -- its tricky but can be done. Been there , done that !!!!!!
I was on a ship where the online generator tripped (low oil pressure tripped the Governor). The bad part of that was the emergency diesel generator was tagged out for pm. It took awhile to get back online.
I’m a former ships engineer from the Norw. Merchant marine and I have worked in engine rooms on many ships, even as a fire technician on B&W boilers. I’ve tended the boilers and lit the boilers from cold status many times, but our systems were never all steam. We had diesel generators and electric pumps which makes things a lot more flexible.
There’s a lot to watch on such boilers, fresh water is produced from seawater - the best drinking water in the world- and fed into the boilers since you will always have to replace what you lose from leaks in the system.
Even the quality of the water is watched every day, chemically treated and maintained.
To run an engine room takes a lot of skills.
I steamed the Babcock Wilcox Boilers for 20 years thanks for the video
"I steamed the Babcock" sounds like some kind of euphemism.
My Dad served on several WW2 era ships like the Ajax, Mispillion, and the Oriskany in the 60 amd 70s. He said it could take up to 2 days to get up steam in bunker oil powered ships. I always loved the sea oil smell on the dock as a kid. It was the smell of adventure to me.
Bunker oil requires heating to lower the viscosity enough to be able to atomize it in the injectors. Feed oil heaters are generally steam.
Options are to light off a boiler using a much lighter oil or to use an auxiliary heater (electric) to heat the bunker oil. Firing with a lighter oil results in a much lower heat output per burner, while the electric heaters don't have the capacity to provide heated oil for more than one or two burners.
The extra time it takes is partially due to using one of the above methods to fire the one boiler with limited fuel capacity and raise enough steam to preheat the other boilers AND supply the main fuel oil heaters. Once you reach this point, you can start adding full capacity burners using the heated bunker fuel.
Newer boilers are designed to use the lighter oil, and can be lit off with main fuel on multiple burners with little or no preheat on the fuel. This allows for a quicker boiler preheat and the ability to add multiple burners for steam generation as soon as the systems are up to operating temp. You can also bring up multiple boilers at the same time.
I'm a former BT that servered on 2 war ships during 1988 - 1994.
I loved operating and working in the Boiler Plant.
It was great and I made life long friends. It's quite a brotherhood unlike most that anyone can imagine.
You did a good job. I actually thought you may have been a BT. Most don't know what the actual parts break down
of a burner assembly. You explained that pretty well.
There ea few other nuances that we would do to that burner once it was out.
We really took a lot of pride in our Plant. It takes a tremendous amount of work to generate that type of cleanly plant. All of us especially when we were underway would clean and do power plant housekeeping.
Love it andstill miss it.
I hear that the Queen Mary recently opened up their Boiler and machinery rooms for tours.
I am a former crew member who stood watch in all the firerooms in the 80's. We used F76 oil for our boilers. The old heaters were removed because we did not need them to preheat the fuel. The firerooms were equipped with a small electric blower and fuel pump for cold light off. There was also a air driven reciprocating water pump on the lower level to fill the boiler prior to start up in emergency. Otherwise a electric pump was used on start up if all the plants were cold. Once we had a boiler and SSTG online. Steam would be crossed over to other firerooms so we could use the steam driven pumps to start another boiler. My watch station was lower level man.
How long did it take to bring the ship going?
I'm glad you mentioned the nozzles, I recall a story during the Pearl Harbor attack, the Nevada had to change nozzles before making a run for it, a risky job since a nearby bomb detonation would send a pressure wave down the stack causing flames to blow back out of the opening. The story went that the fireman just finished installing the final nozzle and got out of the way before the fire blew back out of the boiler!
Keeping the dragon (flames) in a boiler is a balancing job between ID and FD fans. Had an upset on a unit once, and a day or so later I received a video showing the blow-back. Looked up the operator that took it to chastise him for hanging around to take it. His reply "I was trapped in a corner with no way out, wanted a record of what happened, if I was not around to tell it". Did BOT chastise him.
Never in my life did I imagine I could find such a great resource of information about battleships. I have visited several in my life, including New Jersey, North Carolina and Massachusetts. Only now do I realize how little I really knew about them at the time. Thank you so much.
my dad served on a Destroyer Escort, a High Speed Transport (converted from a DE on the ways) and a Command and Control Ship (converted from an LST) from Jan 51 until Jan 55 as a PROUD Boiler Technician 3rd Class...
im going to show him this video tomorrow. im pretty certain hes going to love it. looks like the conditions in that fire room is much better than in his Tin Cans. average of 130oF and the need to wear gloves when climbing the access ladder into or out of the compartment.
thanks for your videos. i LOVE them
It is an ladder in this case too at least if you want to get out FAST. And you can expect this boiler room to be hot too !
My Dad served on an LST during WW2
@bruh he liked the video and was impressed at how clean it was
One of the most memorable quips from my Uncle (RN Commodore Rtd)
"It's a piss poor Captain that can't fire off the boilers on his own ship"
Words to live by
LOL, I guess that means I was a piss poor Captain (retired). I was skipper on a number of very large steam ships and I didn’t begin to have the expertise to get the plant up, my Engineers did. I did have a good understanding of the vessels systems and expect my Chief Engineers would have taken a dim view of me micro managing their realm.
@@northerncaptain855
Ah....but perhaps you are confusing "can't" with "didn't"
Former Machinists Mate 3rd class on the USS Franklin D. Roosevelt (CVA 42) here, served on the FDR from '74 until decomissioning in '77. Stood many, many throttle watches down in #4 Engine Room. I took my job seriously, and tried to learn as much about the boilers as I could, to the point of qualifying as a burnerman in B Division. Had a lot of fun, even served some watches in the boiler rooms. One clear memory I have concerning smoke; there was a watch stationed on the island on the flight deck whose sole job was to monitor the smoke coming from the boilers. If there was smoke, he would notify Main Engineering Control (known simply as Main Control) in the #3 Engine Room and Main Control would relay the info to me over the sound powered phones. "4 engine, the smoke is black". "4 Engine, aye." Then call over to the boiler rooms (each engine had 3 boilers, 2 from each engine were always lit), "Bravo, Charlie, the smoke is black". Back would come the answer, like clockwork: "Bravo's clear, Charlie's clear". Wasn't us boss, that guy up on the island, he must be blind in one eye and can't see out of the other. Yeah, right! Well, one day I got the call and made the call only to hear back "Bravo's clear" and ...nothing. The burnerman in Charlie was new. "Charlie, engine, the smoke is black!". Came the muttered reply "I'm workin' on it!" I didn't say anything, but I heard all the other burnermen really came down on him like a ton of bricks afterward. We laughed about that for a month!!
I was stationed on the Jersey in Fireroom #1. As a fresh boot on the ship, one of my first tasks was to stand smoke watch. At first I thought my leg was being pulled, as in mail buoy watch because of the climb to the O11 level (I believe it was).
I was aboard Rosie in 71 and 72 as a DC. That was about the time that DC's were being changed over to HT's. From what I hear they ended up going back to DC's eventually. Loved Rosie and her bent shaft. We had some interesting times back then. My little brother ended up going Navy and was assigned to the Sylvania. He went to the Dark Side though and became a darn deck ape. While they were in port in Norfolk he got assigned to a work detail to help get all usable stuff from Rosie when they were about to scrap her. He had fond memories of being on her during one of our day cruises that if memories serve me correctly were called "Cub Cruise" where we could take family with us for a day. It's been too long and too many strokes since then to remember all of the details.
The periscopes are an interesting feature. Modern ships use CCTV instead.
The cruise ships I worked on also had smoke density monitors, which basically had a light source at one side of the funnel and a sensor at the other side to actually measure and record smoke density, particularly in Alaska, where we had to comply with local regulations on smoke emissions. (This was a diesel- electric ship of course but we had steam boilers for heating.)
As a former Rosie sailor, B div officer and EEOW in Main Engines Control (located in #3 Engine Room...I appreciated your above recollection. Rosie had undersized forced draft blowers which made her smoke black a lot..a no, no for recovering aircraft. They also wiped bearings frequently because they had to run faster for longer periods. I was on board from 1963-1965,,,no protective clothing or ear protection then...as a result the VA considers me 10% disabled and furnishes me with hearing aides. Nasty.
White , or black smoke is an indication that your boiler is running inefficiently.
Not bad. I could tell that you haven't been fortunate enough to operate these amazing plants.
I was/am a boiler technician BT in the Navy
I served on 2 steam ships on the late 80s/early 90s.
My buddy was a BT on the Mighty Mo
I was a boiler tech on the uss forrestal. When you insert the torch you start counting if it doesn't take off I believe it was 3 seconds. You remove the torch and start to purge to get any raw fuel on the deck of the boiler evaporated. It's really an amazing thing lighting of these huge boilers. I did it probably 2 or 300 times. We had 2 600 psi Babcock and Wilcox boilers in our main space. It truly was an amazing thing. Very very hot in the main space. It's been over 30 years so I forgot alot of the technical terms. But you did a fine job explaining the process. Thanks for the video. It brought back some good memories
Some 50 years ago as a teenager I sketched out my first battleship. Today I realise just how incredibly complex there ships really are. Thank you so much for this!
Not bad. BT3 86-93 CV43 was my first ship with the M-Type dual furnace. There was a "Micrometer valve" which was controlled by the burnerman that allowed you to throttle fuel pressure from 50-350 psi evenly to all burners in operation to maintain 600psi drum pressure at 469° then a portion of that would pass over to the superheated bank to get heated to 850° for the main engine turbans. One drop of water in a turban, well you might as well through in a handful of nuts and bolts at it at 1000+ rpm's. Enjoying a frosty beverage your videos! Keep up the good work Shipmate!
As a retired Chief Boiler Tender (1956-1976, seventeen years sea duty) I suggest you make this video over again. First off, Bunker C is a civilian term. The Navy from WW2 through the early sixties used a semi refined black oil called NSFO or Naval Special Fuel Oil. It was a cut above Bunker C, probably with the lumps filtered out. In the mid sixties we started shifting all steam powered ships to distillate or #2 diesel oil. Just about all ships were converted by the mid seventies. I personally supervised the conversion of 3 destroyers. As for safety gear; it was totally non existent. Every BT I worked with had burn scars, smashed fingers and hearing loss. And now I'm signing law firm affidavits for the families of former 'Snipes' my shipmates and friends who are dying of mesothelioma. I'll quit here before it turns into a rant.
"As for safety gear; it was totally non existent." I'm not saying you're wrong but there is this video from Bataan which shows exactly what Ryan shows in this video with the addition of a flash hood: th-cam.com/video/f4ESNc4tLoc/w-d-xo.html&pp=ygUPbGlnaHRpbmcgYm9pbGVy
The first comment on that video is from someone who claims to have been a sailor in the 80's who says he used the same equipment. Perhaps there was a change in what was acceptable from a safety perspective after you separated.
Woah, so much info.. nonetheless, very educating. Thank you!
In the late 1980's I decommissioned the USS Norton Sound AVM-1 which was produced late in 1944 as a seaplane tender. After the war it was used to test and evaluate weapons systems eventually ending with Tomahawk Vertical launch and Aegis radar the premier fire control system we have now. This ship was the last in our Navy which used black fuel oil for fuel. When we got low on gas they had to have a tanker truck come up from Mexico to refuel us since none of our refineries produced this thick oil. When I was qualifying for Surface Warfare (SW) I stood some watches in the engine room. We used 400 pound steam. The engineer on watch had a bunch of keys they wore around their neck. One of those keys opened the box that had the nozzles which were used only when full top speed was ordered. I remember looking through the periscopes. Topside there was a watch stander that sole purpose was to watch the stack gasses and report if they were producing smoke. This was a game that was played between the engineers and the bridge watch standers to who could spot "making smoke" before the other did. It was a matter of pride not to have an outside non-snipe person tell engineering they weren't doing their job.
Really interesting and enjoyable. I really liked the footage showing the ship back in her prime. Fab work. Look forward to seeing more :)
Pretty good with only one big error. The orange levers on the burners were described as being able to vary the amount of fuel entering the furnace. Actually these are "on" or "off" internal valves for the fuel flow to the burner barrel. The fuel was modulated with more or less pressure to a fuel oil header/pipe that fed all of the burners. Actual modulation of fuel pressure was accomplished with a "Mic" valve which was located at the inlet side of the fuel oil header and fed from the fuel oil service pumps at a constant pressure. The M type boiler had a saturated side furnace and a superheater side furnace - each with its own arrangement of burner assemblies. Fuel oil supply pressure was independent so there were two "Mic" valves - one for each furnace. Other small items were: 1. I never saw steam supplied from shore for a cold-iron light off. We would pull an air casing panel off the boiler at the generating bank side, close all hatches to the fireroom, and put the air supply on high - this pressurized the space and the air had to flow through the air casing to the furnace and up the stack to get out of the space. Hope this was of some interest. BTCM/SGPI BC Reeves USN/ret 1966-1988.
Fun fact boilers have to be greased. Boilers expand and contract with heating and cooling. They have what’s called sliding feet that are required to be greased monthly.
I'm a former MM, docent on the USS Turner Joy, and a part time member of TJ's maintenance crew. Our only open fire room is one of my favorite spaces. I enjoy explaining the steam cycle to visitors. Aboard the TJ we have 4 Babock and Wilcox D-type boilers that pumped out 1,200 PSI steam at 975 degrees. This video makes me want to get to know the boilers on mine even more. I know their operation quite well, but there's much more I can learn.
Between this video and the training videos posted by the USS Joseph P Kennedy Museum I'm able to go into much more detail when taking people through the Turner Joy's boiler room, but I keep it simple enough and interactive. I already knew a bit thanks to my background, but these videos have proven to be a great refresher. Thank you.
I've seen and read pretty much everything about battleship technology for decades, but this rates among the top 10 most interesting. I've always known that rising steam was a complicated and lengthy process, but how and why has been a "black box". But here I got quite an insight in just 8 minuttes! Bravo!
Now I understand a bit more of what my dad did in the navy! ( he was a fireman 2d class aboard a WW1 era mine sweeper) Thanks so much!
Some ships have one or more Auxilliary or Donkey Boiler(s) that you start first, then use the steam from the donkey to run the things the main boiler needs such as steam fuel atomization/burner or draft fans until the main boilers build up steam. Typical Donkey Boilers are vertical fire tube(VFT) boilers.
Great video. I was a BT on a DDG. The concept is all the same. Really miss those days of old
As we get older, our memory of the things back then is a bit kinder than it actually was at the time... We forget the long hours, lack of sleep, crappy pay, crappy food, and officers and CPOs who were on power trips and thought that by making your life miserable, it gave their lives more meaning... :) I'm pretty sure that my memory of my time 40+ years ago is a lot better than it really was at the time, otherwise, I probably would have stayed in...
@@jakeblanton6853 knowing now what I didn’t know then, you can have this modern world. Things were so much simple then. Let’s see you travel the world nowadays like we did back then? I’d go back in a minute SIR
@@bustergutz231 -- Well, it was definitely more fun hitting port back then than these days on cruise ships (even before this COVID-19 nonsense). We were in ports for a couple of days and as such we could stay out all night if we wanted. Cruise ships typically leave port while it is still daylight. Plus, we got to hit the sleazier ports which was a lot more fun when you are single, especially since back then any disease you might catch was curable by penicillin... :) Being single these days with disease that will kill you kind of takes the fun out of the single scene... Kind of like playing Russian Roulette with a M1911... The cruise ships definitely have better food than we had back then though and the staterooms, although small, are better than even most of the officers had aboard even the largest ships, much less the berthing compartments that us enlisted swine had... :) I'll admit that I would like to be able to go back to that time knowing what I know now... I would like to think that I would have made a few less mistakes and might even have ended up with a few less broken bones over the years, but the fact is, those bad experiences are what have made us into the type of person that we are today... I did my time and dropped back into college after I got out, picking up a couple of degrees (and a wife) along the way and ended up being pretty somewhat successful during my career. Enough so that I was able to retire a few years ago with paid off houses, vehicles, and around $2.3M invested in stocks (despite some spectacularly bad choices like GM and Enron)... I don't think I would want to be part of the military these days since it has become too damn politically correct... I spent all of January 2019 in SE Asia (Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore, Vietnam, Thailand, Cambodia), some it on a cruise and some just traveling by air and land... Yeah, definitely the wrong time to be visiting that area thanks to the WuFlu (which my wife and I caught on the last week of the trip)... I can travel the world these days and not have to possibly spend months "haze gray and underway" to do it... When I go out of the country these days, I usually limit myself to a month long trip, sometimes a bit longer... Thanks to AirBnB, I can stay at places that have more "local color" and not just an international hotel all the time... I rent a car while overseas and just drive around, just seeing what I can find instead of going to the typical tourist sights.
And, of course, our music was definitely better back then than the crap that they have these days... Although there was that one particularly nasty period when "disco" came about that kind of a low point in our musical legacy... :)
@@jakeblanton6853 well sir let’s just say that our views on life differ somewhat greatly.I still prefer the simple things in life. This modern technology that you seem to put much trust into is going to Bite you in the ass. But hey, there’s a seat for every ass. God Bless my friend
The Knox class FF's I served on has 1200psi plants. I had buddies who were BT's. They invited me to tour the boiler space. Very impressive and very hot. I preferred to stay up in the CIC. It was air conditioned and didn't have the potential of 1200 PSI steam leaks!
I was Burnerman for number 1 boiler on the USS Frank Cable. This piece is spot on for boilers.. except we didn't have different sized atomizers, but adjusted fuel pressure for that effect. Once, my gloves burst into flame changing a burner barrel. Shook them off, stomped them out, put them back on and got back to work. Love what you're doing. Keep it up!
I just watched this 18 months after it came out. The comments from former BTs were fun to read.
Glad to see the videos rise in quality, and that the new equipment is working for you. I'm a Jersey Boy who left the Garden State for better pastures but I will always love the USS New Jersey. Thank you for keeping her alive.
BT2, 77-81. Brings back quite a few memories. USS Worden CG-18 (78-80) and USS Camden AOE-2 (80-81). Being a BT was a great job, it was the start I needed back then to get me where I'm at today. Will always remember those days.
Hey i served on the Camden as a BT during those years, Steve " Pops" Povkov.
@@stevepovkov9259 That's going back a while. Good ole Bremerton!
@fyrefitrt2 and Migills bar.
Thanks so much for this video. My uncle, Joe Flynn, was a fireman aboard USS Wichita. I've been searching for more information on the Babcock & Wilcox boilers...what they look like, how they work.
OMG that mic makes all the difference!! Love it! ❤️
Designing (and understanding) the network of pipes to make a ship like that work is amazing. I find it fascinating
Consider this, the engineering spaces of a warship contain hundreds of valves and thousands of feet of piping. When you qualified to stand watch in a particular station you had to know every valve on that station and if you changed the position of a specific valve how it effected the overall plant. You had to be able to think fast on your feet if you had problems. I can still remember a lot of valve lineups from a whole lot of ships. MM1(SS/SW) Retired
It's not just limited to the piping, but even the wires and cables for things from lights and telephones, to the fire control systems that can be maned from multiple different locations. They are astoundingly complex.
Retired 21 year active duty BT here. I served on ships built from the early 60’s to my last built in 1998. None of these required steam in order to lite-off the boilers. From a cold start to full pressure 600-1200 psi would take between 4-6 hours.
Nice job! I was at BT on the destroyer Rogers 876 from 68-72. I cleaned many times the boilers. Fireside’s they called it where you went and watersides inside the mud drum. I was an Oil King for the ship the last year and tested boiler and drinking water along with testing oil transferred to us.
Love that “protective gloves” “leather jacket” while lighting off. Never happened on the ships I steamed. The fuel was not bunker c, it was NSFO, Navy Special Fuel Oil. Just a step above bunker c. On my first ship our fuel pumps would not produce enough fuel pressure when running on shore steam. We had a hand cranked fuel pump for lighting off from cold iron status until we built up to 150 psig, enough to run a fuel oil pump and a forced draft blower.
Much of the time spent to get boilers operational was gradually heating up the furnace brick work and boiler tubes. Water circulation in the boiler tubes is essentially zero. Low heat is needed to start circulation to prevent tube damage. Boiler drum and superheater vents have to be open to purge O2 from boiler water and to allow room for water to be pumped in. Old timers said once upon a time wood fires were first built in the furnace to keep initial heat intensity down before opening oil burners.
Warm up curve also
I'm an engineer at a large urban hospital. For many, many years we burned #6 fuel oil in our boilers, which are Babcock-Wilcox D-types. While our light off procedure is a little bit different, we still had the same fuel guns, except ours were longer and had a slightly different style atomizer. We would change our guns once every 8 hours and clean them up, so I'm very familiar with that routine. Great video.
Me too although not B&Ws we burned #6 in our D-type water tube Cleaver Brooks since 1970 been there 33 years myself just decomming them now for new CB firetubes.jim 2nd Eng.
@@TheShawna1 The old hospital, which was torn down in the early 70s, had old CB's. Old timers used to tell me how those were sometimes a handful to deal with. They'd tell me that when one of those boilers took a notion to be a pain in the neck to run, it would take a bit of work to get it running right, otherwise they were very very reliable.
the idea of a heating system requiring adjustment every 8 hours sounds insane in the modern world :D
@@tsm688 We changed them to keep the boilers running efficiently and prevent buildup in the atomizers. We had a good crew here and it was no trouble to get the job done in 5 minutes, including re-light. It all sounds terribly complicated but if a man had two functioning brain cells in his head and followed a straightforward procedure, he could get the hang of things very quickly.
On Essex class carriers during the Vietnam era we had the same basic equipment (8 Babcock and Wilcox M type boilers in 4 firerooms, 600 psi @750F) but there was no safety equipment like a helmet or leather jacket. these must have been improvements made between the my era and the 80's. Also that red lever that you used to let in the fuel oil was just a needle valve with a "faucet type" handle. Your narrative states that there are nine burners with five on the "saturated side" and five on the "superheated side," really just four on the "superheated side."
The color scheme looks correct, it takes me back in time for sure.
I was on the USS Hancock (CVA-19), we sailed side by side with the New Jersey on Christmas morning 1968 when Bob Hope transferred from our ship to the New Jersey about ~10am. At 8am that morning we were within the "+12 nautical mile limit" of the territorial waters. I think I've called out our position correctly, anyway, this is in reference to Agent Orange caused diseases. I would be interested in whether or not the New Jersey had qualified and if any of your interviewees had any claims with the VA for Agent Orange related diseases, i.e. the service connected diseases.
You bought the lavaliere mic!!!!!!! Nice!
So much more intelligible, thanks!
Thank you Ryan, and all the great comments on these very interesting videos........ Best stuff on You Tube I’ve seen in a while........ Also thank you Vet’s🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸
I can't imagine how hot it was for the boiler techs or how loud it must have been to be in the blower and turbine rooms. It surprises me that men dealt with such hardships on a daily basis while at war and under threat of being sent to the bottom with little to no chance of escape. Much respect for the engineers and techs who had to do this for their whole careers.
Happy New Year Ryan and crew of New Jersey! Thank you for the great videos !
Ex BT2 Top Watch on CV-59 USS Forrestal 3MMR. We had “D” type 600psi. 4x65,000hp main engines. The fun started when they launch aircraft and up to a million horsepower of steam had to be replaced in the accumulators in about a minute.
This was legit so cool to learn, vastly interesting dude.
Also, the new mic is a win, sound quality is farrr better lol
I was not a very good kid. I had model of the New Jersey and I loved it...Loved to play with it too much too. I love our Navy and I really appreciate all the work the crews of these museum ships do. I'm land locked so it's not very economical for me to visit them but I'm glad they're there.
was a b.t. on the uss roanoke 78-82 aux. pump man never had the pleasure of a burner man and we had a control station for air and gas. thanks for the video!
Thanks for this video. I was a HT but spent as much time as possible in the fire room of the USS Simon Lake. I did get to light off a burner several times - in full protective gear.
Great quality & good audio. Nice work folks thanks for the video!
Your No.1 burner has its flange shielding intact (the tinfoil looking material wrapped around the fuel oil inlet flange....last flange before the burner assembly). However, the other numbered burners seem to be lacking complete flange shields. This would be a major safety violation and would prevent lighting off the boiler until they were properly in place.
I am a BT1(sw) USN ret. Steamed FF1078 class frigate, USS Joseph Hewes/USS Cape Cod AD-43/USS Lynde McCormick DDG-8 and USS New Orleans LPH-11.
Combustion Engineering 1200lb'rs Babcock & Wilcox 1200lb'rs and 600lb'rs on the tender and gator freighter. Glad to answer BT questions.
My grandfather served on the new jersey during the korean war as a BT1 , looking forward to visiting the ship with my son sometime this year to show him where his great grandfather served
What I like most about these is they show things I didn't even think of. You just light like the boiler at home, No not at all. More like the furnace's at work :D
Excellent video. I'm an ex fireman (boiler tech) and everything you said is spot on.
Had an older friend that started as an ensign on an old Fletcher class.
For some reason they sent him to chip rust in the bilge.
He chipped a quarter inch hole through the bottom of the hull, and had trouble sleeping the rest of the deployment.
I'm really enjoying these videos, my dad took me to see loads of ships when I was a kid, HMS Belfast, HMS Victory, Mary Rose, cutty sark, ss Great Britain, I loved it but my daughter hates it unfortunately, she agreed to a weekend to go and see Mary Rose and then the pandemic put paid to that one. I will get over their to visit one day, keep up the good work.
Now there's a good trivia question to get someone with; "Where does an Iowa class Battleship keep its periscopes?". Why, in the fire room of course!
Where does an American Battleship keep a Japanese periscope? On the pier! But actually, check this out th-cam.com/video/AtwVlAH-hLI/w-d-xo.html
probably other places also, the turrets?
There are so many periscopes on a battleship, I've lost count.
On more modern USN steam powered ships we have stack gas analyzers with a digital readout that would let you know the condition of your exhaust. Additionally during boiler lite-off we would have a watchstander topside with sound powered phone headsets that would monitor the stack. The reason for this is during extreme white or black smoke conditions there will unburned atomized fuel in the smoke which can cause an explosion.
Were are the periscopes on a Nimitz class carrier? In the reactor compartment walls. Leaded glass periscopes to allow viewing into the compartment for visual inspections.
Dude you have an impressive amount of knowledge on the complex systems and weapons of that ship. Bravo Zulu.
You just keep on getting better and better. Bravo Zulu, shipmate.
Looks and sounds fantastic! What a great beginning to the new year. Thank you to Ryan and the production team. Full steam ahead for 2021!
Another great video. Thanks Ryan. Now we need an in depth discussion about the fuel pudding you reference at 2:20. And all these years I thought the USN was driving up the price of the green diesel I put in my Ford Powerstroke
Awesome !
My Battleship has given me nothing but trouble,
but now I think I might finally get things going.
Thanks Ryan !
When i made Chief, my fellow CPO’s made sure I was initiated by the Boiler Techs. Never to be forgotten.
Through put on the sprayers is also controlled somewhat by the size of the hole in the orrifice. The bigger the hole the more oil can get into the furnace. On the old Admiralty three drum boilers used by the allies behind the nozzle is a swirl plate this causes the oil to come out of the nozzle with a spiral movement. This allows for better mixing hence better combustion. The way the periscope work or in our case we used to call them smoke mirrors. Principle of operation is the same, light source is at the back of the boiler usually just a lamp, you look up into the mirror for the light, if you could see it then no smoke is going up the uptakes. If the fuel air ratio is upset smoke is generated and this blocks the light source. hence can then tell by the absence of light how much smoke you are making.
I was a BT aboard the USS Lexington AVT 16 in the mid 80's. Most of the plant is very similar. She is now a museum ship in Corpus Christie Texas.
0:08 Love that enorrrrmous meter on the left!
Fantastic. Much better audio and well edited. Also really interesting to hear more about the boilers!
I was a cook on an aircraft carrier... First... Our boiler rooms were not that clean. Yours is almost as clean as our galley and a bit cleaner than our bakery. Next, I am sure that we used fire tube boilers rather than water-tube boilers. On board Constellation our boilers looked just about the same as the stationary boilers found in buildings. That is to say, the old coal boilers in our monastery were bigger than your battleship boilers, albeit we have not run such high pressures, and our max pressure was about 125 from back in the days when we generated electricity for the town. But that ended when people found out about AC current. Ach... we recently got a new gas powered boiler (and if my servers were working I'd show it to you) it is much smaller that the coal/oil/gas boilers that we used to run, but puts out way more horsepower. We went back to coal when coal was cheaper, today gas is cheaper so hence the new boiler. Some of the fittings had to be removed to get it into the boiler room, and we did have to remove the boiler room doors as well. Fortunately Drachinifel gave a great course on water-tube boilers. When I was on board the Jersey a summer or two ago I was able to look into the boiler room from Broadway and wondered about its tiny size. It did not measure up to the boilers on a carrier! : )
There really isn't a considerable size difference in these boilers, you just can't really see the boilers very well in this video because the thing is so big, there is a platform deck in the middle of it and a bulkhead only 8 feet away from it so you just can't really see the whole thing.
The boiler manual specifically called out using a zippo. One reason is Bic/butane lighters used to be technically banned from the engineering spaces due to their(alleged) ability to rupture in your pocket. (I can affirm that one will eventually "pop" if you leave it on top of the main steam line prior to light-off). Not really a good idea to be monkeying around in a really hot space with a bottle of flammable pressurized fluid in your pocket.
Pro tip- Smoke color has a lot more to do with not blowing the face off the boiler than you might suppose. The smoke is used as an indication on how rich/lean the combustion is. Extended running in either condition can lead to some unwanted outcomes like the entire watch team getting parboiled.
Amassing of unburnt gases in the fire box ??? That has a habit of ruining everyones day.
Still banned in our mill.
Had a butane torch lighter that over heated inside my car. When I went to light a cigar I wound up with a softball sized fireball right in front of me. 2nd degree burns to my right cheek and back of left hand.
VERY jealous of your job. Excellent video and overall series.
Now thats a guy that loves his job. Making videos on New Years Eve and New Years day. Awesome !💪
If you don't already know, we put out videos 5 days a week, plus oral history interviews every day!
@@BattleshipNewJersey Thats freaking awesome. I nerd out on all the content. My wife says im obsessed lol
@@BattleshipNewJersey Damn 5 vids a week. is there really that much stuff on the ship to maintain that level of content.
@@Mythbuster3808 we're up to 400 or so now and going strong!
I actually work as a engineer in a company that produces industrial burners. The tech has gone a long way but it's still similar enough. Some part do not change the atomizer the viewport, but now we have everything wired up. Sercos instead of handles :)
I'm not a former boiler tech however, adjusting the smoke from thick black to thin white is similar to using a offset wood smoker. You have to adjust the air to fuel ratio to obtain an optimum thin blue smoke for an even smoke. Interesting how they are similar. I also remember watching a vid on another YT channel on how they light the steam boilers. Thanks for sharing and Happy New Year Ryan!!
the compartment code at the beginning is a nice touch.
I’m not sure of how much nor how quickly steam load on BB
would fluctuate. I do know that the cats on CV would necessitate cutting burners in and out, resulting in quite a little
choreography amongst BTs that I as MM, could only watch in awe. We had our own little dances. Good men all.
Thanks for the description. Similar to a lot of other marine boilers except the periscopes!
This just made me realize something I didn't think I ever knew I needed/wanted before... An Iowa-class simulator... Hell, a Montana-class simulator!
World of Warships does that. :3
Not what I mean. WoWS is an arcade naval shooter. I mean A SIMULATOR!
@@LexieAssassin I've been wanting the same thing. It was learning about how all the fire control/gun directors work that made me realize how cheap World of Warships is.
One of the best videos you’ve made so far.... Really really enjoyed it
A Little known fact is that if no auxiliary generators are available for a cold start, you can always get the Admiral and other senior rates to go down to the Engine Room.
There, they will generate enough Hot Air to warm the Fuel Oil and get the process started.
Nodding
Happy 2021 to yourself and all connected with the safekeeping of BB-62! More engine room/boiler room vids please :) We never used shore-side steam when starting up from cold in drydock. We'd fire the boiler with gas oil, adding load to the boiler gradually - feed pump first, then bunker C oil pre-heaters, then turbo-alternators. Once fully established, the superheater vent was closed, and the second boiler fired up. Interesting that the superheaters on New Jersey have their own burners. With us, the saturated steam emerged from the top of the steam drum ( Foster Wheeler ESD-3 boilers ) then passed through superheater tubes next to the furnace - no additional burners fitted.
The second side wasn't just superheater. It had water tubes on that side too. The superheater was near the furnace, but still had a water tube screen in front of it. After the superheater there would be water tubes and finally feedwater heating.
The need for separating the superheater to only one side was related to the fact that warships spend much of their life at a small fraction of full power. Since speed is related to the cube of the power, cruising at half speed only is 1/8 power! Over such a wide range of power levels, a conventional boiler would have a huge drop in outlet temperature. By putting all of the superheater on one side, adjusting the fuel between the two sides could adjust the superheat. At light load, the superheater side would be turned down far more to limit the superheat to a safe value.
@@matthewbeasley7765 Thanks for the explanation. As you probably guessed, I was speaking from the perspective of a merchant ship, and so it's an education to see and hear how the steam plant differed on a particular type of warship. One day I'll get over there and have a look round myself! Thanks again. :)
I was an MM3 on the USS Monongahela and that ships boilers had 2 burners on the top and were lit off electrically and we burned jp5 because it burned cleaner than dfm which minimized soot build up on the tubes. Thanks for the video! I'd like to see one from the engine room.
70+ year old boilers, at sea (salt environment) and yet I cant get a water heater to last 4 years....
Boiler feed water is very pure distilled water with some special additives to inhibit corrosion. You are not heating distilled water, nor do you have somebody taking and analyzing water and fuel samples every hour.
Speaking towards your hot water heater, you probably have hard water. You need to completely flush your hot water heater at least once per year to get rid of the sediment created when you heat mineralized water. Shut of the power (or gas), hook a garden hose to the drain valve down at the bottom, turn it on, and let the water run until you no longer see particles coming out. This will be easier if you drain the tank, remove that cheap plastic drain valve, and replace it with a 1/4 turn full-flow ball valve.
BEFORE you turn the power back on, purge all air out of the tank by running all of the hot water faucets until no air is present. Turn the power on with air in the tank and we will be discussing how to replace an element.
You might consider a water softener. You are probably also replacing dishwashers, washing machine solenoid valves, sink faucets, toilet tank valves, and coffee pots on a regular basis as well.
@@kevincrosby1760 I was going to reply, "but I have a water softener".... but then you were overly nice and went on with advice.
I have well water, 500 feet from the Chesapeake Bay, across the river from the old Beth Steel plant. We have so much iron in the ground our blood cells clang when they bump into each other. It's a on going battle with iron out salt pellets and flushes. I really think a gas WH would be better but the whole house is electric so....
tks
@@finscreenname So lucky I guess to have soft water, so soft that it will strip the zinc out of brass fittings. Also you can use it out of the tap to drink, nothing else required. Only reason I have water filters is because half the piping is either century old asbestos or iron in the supply system, and the reservoirs are not exactly silt free. Takes a year for them to go light brown.
@@SeanBZA Ours will mess up some fixtures also even with the softener. Especially the cheaper ones. We moved here because of the water 500 feet down the street, not what's in the ground so we have adapted. 😁
@@finscreenname I try to assume that others may be having the same issues, and might find the advice helpful.
I do feel your pain. If my water were any harder, I would need to shovel it into the sink. Iron content is high enough that you can clearly see every place a faucet was allowed to drip over the years.
Filters are sitting on floor. Water softener will be ordered Monday when Stimulus posts to account. Been dealing with this for almost 6 years. After the filters and softener are done, I have several hundred feet of Pex to start installing.
So cool. I'm a plumber in Rockland County, NY. This was fun!
You KNOW that you have mastered the pipe threader when you have no leaks at 600 PSI and 850 F or 1200 PSI and about 1000 F.
That was great to see Ryan, My father and Uncle were B.T. On the Uss Missouri. All he ever told me was he was a BT. So seeing this video now I have a small idea of what his duties were. He passed in 2003 and being his ship is in Pearl Harbor I will never get to see it. Would love to come aboard Jersey just to see 3 areas if it is possible to be brought there.. the old type bunks the boiler room where you just showed and the brig. Yea he told me he spent some time in there also LOL . But thanks for the videos and and congrats on your new job aboard the New Jersey
Even in our home port with power supplied, we kept one boiler online at all times unless repairs were absolutely needed.
I really like these videos, thank you for making them. That is all, good day.
The microphone makes it so much better.
The fact that the ship had 850F, 600PSI running all over to power things is a gently terrifying thought. One packing lets go on a valve and you probably have a jet that has the same effect on flesh as a light saber.
Welcome to our World....
You search for steam leaks with a broom. Leak sounds like a train; hold the broom well in front of you and wave it around the pipe or valve. Broomstick gets cut in half...you've found the leak!
Note: For everything outside the actual engineering spaces (galley, laundry, space heat, etc.) the pressure was reduced to 150 or even 50 psi.
They are 600 pound Babcock and Wilcox boilers. I had an engineer tell me during the war, they bought up steam using a wood fire in the firebox. It took a while, then steam started to heat up heavy fuel oil in the settlers and storage tanks. Finally they got one turbo generator in service and switched to using diesel to come up to 600 pounds. Finally, when fuel oil is about 200-225 it can fire a boiler. I was a boiler tech striker in the service ( Coast Guard ) Then I sailed as a fireman watertender on an old U S Lines freighter. Then sailed as an oiler for Lykes Brothers Steamship. Then I moved on to being an electrician.
audio is awesome now.. cheers for the new year
Lol at the quality in quotes : ) Love your videos. They are quality for real.
Brian your light off procedure just caused a furnace explosion. Before you admit oil to the burner you must add air to the burner. I ran 2 m type boilers on the USS Springfield CLG7, from 1968 to1970 left the navy as BT1 became a boiler inspetor for 39 years.
Someone earlier mentioned the boiler sliding feet--old story of a ship that kept wiping the spring bearings(main shaft support bearings) They couldn't figure it out so they brought in an old salt who wanted to see the sliding feet on the boiler. Sure enough the sliding feet had not been maintained and was actually warping the hull of the ship, causing the spring bearing problems. Greasing the sliding feet was always a critical PMS check
You're getting better at addressing the camera instead of looking away when you speak. Keep up the good work.
You'd be surprised at how many 'professional speakers' that turn their head away from the mic and keep on talking as if we can hear them. Ryan's much better than them by a wide berth.
Ryan is a Superstar of the internet and the new mic is way better. 👍🇭🇲