A few months ago, I made a question about the proposed Portuguese battleship - in between the end of the War and the WNT, if the Portuguese had the money, what battleship/battle cruiser could have bought, and what upgrades could have receive in the 1930's?
I just had done a bit of research into the 15mm BESA the British licensed produced version of the Czech ZB-60 which came in anto aircraft mounts was any consideration given to using this weapon in the anti aircraft role by the British? Especially given some ships used the 12.7mm Vickers mounts the 15mm BESA has quite superior ballistics and belt fed and a fair bit lighter than the Vickers design
When you come back to America, any plans to come back to NC, they have a full size replica of a Civil War monitor call CSS Neus along with everything left of the original ship when they pulled her from the mud
Was the torpedo pressurization system retained to handle the aviation fuel for scout planes? Not only for moving fuel but purging fuel lines to reduce fire risk.
The reason battleships became non-viable was due to loss of offensive capability as a result of vastly increasing battle ranges (due to aviation), not due to vulnerability. Assuming that weapons that effectively outrange battleship guns such as aircraft never came to exist, how long would it have taken for battleships to have been rendered obsolete due to being too vulnerable to newer weapons?
So glad she's finally in dock for a good bit of repair work, it would be a crime to lose such a historic ship. We're extremely fortunate to have people doing their best to keep her in one piece for years to come.
@@phoenixprime24 Mikasa is still a dreadnought. Dreadnoughts are a type of battleship; the term "pre-dreadnought" is not a different type of ship, it is just a time periodical name: that being it was built before HMS Dreadnought was built.
@@Train115 mikasa is not a dreadnought as she was built in 1899 and HMS dreadnought was built in 1906 a pre-dreadnought is a battleship built before 1906
The last WW1 dreadnought left in the world. Definitely worth saving. Great to see the people of Texas taking care of a national heirloom of a bygone era.
@@Da_TboneLife Admiral Fisher's design for HMS Dreadnought is the original for which all other dreadnoughts and super-dreadnoughts are based. HMS Dreadnought herself was scrapped in 1923.
@@daxlucero2437 Texas is the only remaining dreadnought ship and she is the only remaining battleship that was commissioned between 1903 and 1940. And that is not the real Mikasa. That is a mostly reconstruction of "Mikasa". The original Mikasa was sunk and destroyed in an explosion after WWI. There is only about 20% left of the original Mikasa and everything on her is fake like the fiberglass "turrets". Texas OTOH has all her 1910s and 1920s original internal engines and equipment and even 9 out of 10 of the 14" guns on her now were her original 1913 14" guns! They were on Pennsylvania for 15 years before being rotated back onto her in late 1944 where they have been ever since. There are only 15 surviving 14" guns in the world and Texas has 10 of them.
Drachs obsession with knife edge switches and calling for people to pull levers-has given me the slighly worying image of Drach attempting to use kites electricity and a tall tower to attempt to bring warships to life.
A little known fact is that behind the scenes in Iowa’s recent turret rotation was Drach throwing a comically oversized knife edge switch connecting their shore power
It is so fascinating to me how rudimentary everything on Texas is. Compared to an Iowa, its all there: the barbette interior, ready-use shells in the turrets, flash doors, even the hoist for the 3 inch powder. I can see where things like the dredger hoist, shell decks, and the powder passing was evolved from, but its just much older and very first generation compared to an Iowa. Same with the Bureau Express boiler, its so rudimentary and first generation I love it! I plan on visiting Texas when she finds a new home. COME ON TEXAS!
What's also crazy about that is that Texas was a leap ahead of her predecessors in technology and design. She was sometimes called a super-deadnought, and I wonder what a pre-dreadnought battleship would have been like on the inside.
Thanks for the tour. Screw the rust as that can be addressed over time. It's a miracle that the old girl still even exists. It's also fortunate that she was never modernized like the Iowas and still retains that old school battleship ambiance.
If the Iowas hadn't been modernized, they'd be razor blades in a city dump, with miscellaneous 'parts-is-parts' laying on some museum's side lawn. Do you think the 'maritime states' like Iowa, Missouri, or Wisconsin would have cared enough to step up to the plate?
Really old school. He shows us bunks. That ship was built when they still used hammocks. Bunks showed up between the wars. USS Tennessee actually had her hammocks at Pearl Harbor. Just like Nelson.
I think the point made in the intro is definitely one worth making. Yes, Texas has got into a terrible condition but then (Taking an example as a Brit) so did HMS Victory, and while I think faceless bureaucratic apathy has certainly played a significant part, a lot of the issues Texas is having are, like Victory, down to the fact no-one has gone through these lessons of how to preserve a ship this big before. USS Olympia and Georgios Averof are probably the next oldest ships and they are a LOT smaller than Texas so simply won't have the same problems as Texas or on the same scale. In fact, it's probably worth saying that the current volunteer crew are just like anyone else and had been so utterly appalled at how much Texas was suffering, and they've taken action to form the current administration and so they are literally on the same side as anyone else who wants Texas to live on for another hundred years. I imagine the rest of the Battleship Museum fleet are all watching the lessons of Texas and furiously making notes, which is a nice continuity for Texas herself; she is still informing US Battleship development that leads to the Iowa's, just in museum form than combat form. I'm hopeful those ships, perhaps even something like Salem and Little Rock will be able to learn from Texas and suffer fewer problems of their own because of Texas.
I've been all over the Olympia and its amazing how much the 20 years between her launching and the Texas' launching created a difference in ships. As old as this looks compared to the New Jersey, the Olympia looks that much older than the Texas. Biggest problem Olympia has is her hull is riveted. Dry docks aren't used to dealing with that here so they won't give a repair estimate since they don't want to underbid the work, but the Olympia can't gather funding without a total estimated cost ugh.
a lot of the Brits problem's is their insistence on voting for socialism, leftist's hate a successful western country and seek to minimize the many historic achievements made by the same
Hey! When I was a kid, I visited many factories that still had all that stuff working! And I'm not 100! Of course, it was obsolete, but working! And it was so interesting! Like Drach says, it seems scary, but you could see in a second exactly what was wrong! I'll bet that was handy!
Those volunteers sound like they went through what the US Navy went through with Congress, with having to do and wanting to do a lot of work but none of the budget to do it, so well done to them for keeping the old girl alive this long.
Yeah the government is good at spending a lot of money in places that have no purpose. Like those LCS ships that they want to scrap and then build new ones.
@@AT-xr8qh the LCS is actually more like the abrum-x it was a test bed for advanced and untested technology think of it like a trial by fire, space x is doing the same thing. It’s important to find fault’s in untested tech before battle, it might not have been the most successful but it wasn’t a waste either.
At one point the state-of-the-art in ship preservation was to stick it in concrete like Mikasa - they avoided that option (thankfully) because it was too expensive. Now that they have the money and the will, they can safely restore it properly. Whether it will sell tickets in this day and age is another question entirely (just ask Szimansky).
@@randbarrett8706 Best Governor ever! Those "political stunts" mean closing off the border from 100s of thousands of illegal aliens poring through, that your President won't address.
I'm very pleased to hear that, vis-a-vis the USS Texas, "the reports of my death are greatly exaggerated." An ironical phrase attributed to a man, who was himself, a Mississippi river pilot.
I made a donation a while back and received a jam nut from one of the 5" guns. It is the centerpiece of my militaria collection. I am glad there is a significant effort to preserve this ship.
My grandfather's brother, Joseph Anton Droll, enlisted in the Navy in 1918, at the same time as my grandfather. My grandfather spent WW1 as a deckhand on a transport, and got an expeditious discharge at the end of the war. His brother Joseph decided to stay in and on the 1920 US Census he appears as an Engineman 2nd Class aboard USS Texas. I really appreciate seeing the pictures of the lower half of one of the engines he worked on.
The state of the ship has almost has as much to do with time as it does with money and the know how to apply it. Got to remember, BB-35 was the first museum ship and no one knew how to take care of them or how much money it was going to take. On top of that, the decay of the ship which was held back by a full complement was now being managed by a small skeleton crew of volunteers. I think they did a great job considering what they had to work with.
I agree with you. At the time the took control of the vessel they had to learn as they went on how to to preserve it. Disappointing that Drachfinal didn’t give any kudos to the original staff.
there is a great rundown with the curator of Texas and the curator of New Jersey about what was known when Texas was first turned into a museum ship vs what was done differently when Newjersy was and the Drydocking of Texas was letting them plan for when New Jersey goes in later
To be fair she comes from the time before they invented saftey! In her day you just did dangerous stuff as carefully and intelligently as possible, and natural selection and all that.... Imagine though falling into a switchboard....ooof ... there's not much coming back from that one..... Not that modern ships are much better, my last ship had some maintenance that had to be done in one case while standing on the rudder ram (which was fun while underway) or in another case directly bellow the main coupling (prop shaft) which like wise was awsome fun with those noce petite 6.5" nuts and bolts whizzing a few inches from your dome. Of course the fiberglass wrapping on the shaft made for a decent back massager at anything below ahead standard, and at about a 2/3 bell it made a decent tread mill as well..... Saftey frack it! Overrated stuff that, bunch of hog water and a real buzz kill!
I thank you volunteers they are supporting and doing a great job. When i was living in Houston i was eight years old my dad took me on the great USS TEXAS i had a ball,and she was a lot more healthier. I'm so ready to Aboard she again I'm turning 77 in June so i can't wait !❤
I camped out on the Texas as a cub scout years ago. They let us crank the wheels to aim the AA guns at the San Jacinto monument back in the day. Glad she’s getting repairs!
I saw her as a boy about 1969. She was in much better shape then. Everything was painted dark blue but the amount of rust was not like this. Still, she will rise again!
Thanks for your excellent doc of BB Texas. As a child I walked and climbed down her gangways, almost falling down some of them. My father kept a hand on the back of my shirt luckily.. Guess it was 54. I was very disappointed when told I couldn't fire the big guns. Not even the 40 mm. Seems like Dad mentioned I was just the right size to fit into the 14in breach... He was there off North Africa and saw the Texas fire. His transport was placed in sight of her in the convoy from the states. Your presentations are always appreciated. Glad to see you bringing attention to ships like the Texas and other important remnants of naval history before its too late. Your efforts will always be appreciated.
On the topic of rust, sometimes it's actually better to leave it alone. Depending on the structure and quality of steel, once a surface has corrosion present, it typically doesn't acquire any more beyond the surface layer. So long as moisture is kept away from it, it will sit quite happily for many years. That's why old airplanes are mothballed in the desert, because while parts of them may acquire a surface level of rust, it rarely penetrates the metals to any depth. That's why when you mothball a ship you seal it up and emplace dehumidifiers everywhere, by removing the interior moisture you preserve the ship without undue expense. If they are not ready to de-rust and coat each surface with whatever product they use to prevent rust, leaving it alone is often the best choice.
@@FoxtrotYouniform️ Exactly. Also, aluminum forms a layer of oxide(ie. aluminum oxide, basically aluminum "rust") which acts as an almost impenetrable, protective barrier that dramatically reduces further corrosion. That same concept also applies to other metals, like tin, chromium, zinc, nickel, etc. But that does _not_ apply to naked iron or steel that isn't alloyed with chromium. Iron oxide(rust) does _not_ form an impenetrable barrier on the surface of steel or iron, so it provides almost no protection against further corrosion.
@@FoxtrotYouniform You may as well leave it there. It's not like anyone's ever seen holes in thin, steel auto body panels caused by rust. Sure there's holes, and sure, there's always lots of rust surrounding the holes, and there's no holes in the areas without rust. But damn if I can figure out what's causing those holes! Lol
It’s really telling that under the Texas Department of Parks and Wildlife, Battleship Texas had been in the water so long that her frames had rusted to nothing. Within 3 years of the Battleship Texas foundation taking over, she was in drydock getting massive structural repairs.
Its a terrible fact ,that, the old adage, we're from the government, we're here to help! Strikes fear in the historical ship preservation communities 😮😮😮
It's remarkable the last Dreadnought battleship is still around, the Texas is 110 years old, so it's impressive she has endured the test of time. I have not visited the Texas since 2009, I was part of a tour while I was in the RCN, she was quite impressive, so I hope the Texas will be restored for everyone to marvel at.
My wife and I own a rental property down in Galveston, I get down there about once a month to check up on the house and make my way over to the dockyard afterward. The amount of progress with repairs made between months is astonishing. In regards to how she got to the sad state that she's in, well its been an inter-agency mess over the decades, greed and abuse. At least she's in good hands now, and will be the best she's ever been post WW2.
I remember when i was 10, going to see the Texas and Lexington on a family vacation, they were sure an impressive sight moored within sight of each other.
16:34 If I remember correctly from one of the videos over on the Battleship New Jersey channel, Ryan was talking about something very similar going on with New Jersey's armored trunk, I think it got to the point where one end was mostly blocked off by cabling making it very difficult to actually get out of the shaft on that end.
The men whose battle stations were basically inside the 14-inch guns were their era's real-life equivalents of the guys stationed in the Death Star superlaser subway tunnels. :)
Thanks for the encouragement for us all to donate to Battleship Texas Foundation no matter how small. Made my donation about three weeks ago. If every Drach subscriber could give a dollar, we’d raise $425k. If everyone could even give $10, it’d be $4.25M. Nice tour Drach!
I toured this ship nearly 25 years ago during a very hot Texas August afternoon (hot for someone from southern Ontario, Canada) and it was really heartbreaking to see her listing at her location at San Jacinto so many years later. A salute to those who are striving to keep this old battlewagon intact. She is one of a kind and all of her contemporaries are long gone.
Glad I went to see her in Huston before she was moved to dry dock. A very impressive ship, even with the extensive corrosion. Thanks for bringing more attention to her.
I'm 60 years old this year. I went to the USS TEXAS back when I was in the first grade. I was in awe at the size of the ship. Being there awakened my interest in WWII history. I hope they continue to repair and maintain it. It is a shining example of our countries Navy!!! Great video thank you for the info and keep up the great work ❤
My Grandfather was a WW1 US Navy Veteran. He was A Electrcians Mate 1st class. While I don’t know exactly what ship he was on I can only imagine that he was very familiar with those old electrical systems such as these. Thank you for sharing these videos. They help me reconnect with my family history.
I toured the Texas back in 2000ish, I am hopeful to get to tour it again once she lands a new home. The amount of work needed/being done is mindblowing to me.
Great tour! I think you went places that even the old "Hard Hat" tour didn't go. It was nice too see part of the conning tower, when i visited years ago the upper compartments were screened behind plastic partitions. Another good video source is from one of the volunteers: "Tom Scott, the Older One". He has dozens of deep dive videos on Texas. I'm pretty sure that unlike the gun you saw, they have one (I don't know which turret) gun fairly cleaned up and mechanically functional. It's in one of Tom's videos.
As a naturalized Texan, I'm happy for you that you were able to visit this beauty! I'm also happy the government isn't directly responsible for her; otherwise, none of this would have been happening. I hope you're able to be with her on her next journey and hopefully my family can get to go visit her some day.
Amazing. She's beautiful in a terrifying way. Loved the engines. So glad they are saving her. I still wish Enterprise CVN 65 was saved as a museum ship. She was/is one of the most famous ships.
Thank you for making this video, I last saw Texas in person about 20 years ago, and seeing her as she is now fills me with a broad spectrum of emotions. I have always felt a certain connection to this ship, more so than other museum ships, as my grandfather served aboard her in the late 1920's .
Somewhere on TH-cam is an organization that 3D scanned Texas' triple expansion engine and explains the various parts and how it works. It was very interesting, and quite strange seeing the virtual engine floating in the void of space.
If I remember correctly from my visit in 2019, that scan is available for viewing above those engines. Engines of that type and size only exist in one other place, the bottom of the Atlantic.
Awesome pictures and great tour. On my bucket list is to visit all the US battleships at some point (New Jersey is already checked off). COVID put a crimp in my plans as my trip to USS Alabama was cancelled as a result. The pictures of the switchboards and Drach's love of knife switches is one of the best parts of the video. Those panels are referred to as live front-open panel systems. They are obviously extremely dangerous, but also the easiest to maintain, repair and generally keep clean. They served for a long time in the fleet (longer than most people would think). USS Vulcan still had a panel like that in the mid 80's before getting it replaced with a closed panel-dead front switchboard after a sailor had been electrocuted. Having panels like that on a big ship like Texas and even Vulcan is one thing, but they were also aboard small ships like the 4 stackers as well and one can imagine that the watch was very attentive to what they were doing while underway in any sort of sea while standing near one of those panels. It was also interesting for me to see the EOT's (Engine order telegraph) and other position repeaters for the guns, etc. Part of my rating in the Navy was to work on that stuff and it is remarkable how little it changed over the years between when Texas was built and the 1980's. Thanks for sharing Drach and hope you have had very enjoyable visits all over the states. We do seem to have a lot of ships to visit. 😀
I love this. My grandfather was on the Texas before the refit. He was an F1 "black gang -no offense) working the engine room using coal. He also helped during the first launch of an aircraft off the turret 2 I believe. He was a boxer and although they now don't have all of them,, his name was on one before 1928. He loved that ship. Thanks for all of the videos. My son has toured it with me in 1996. Awesome.
Nice to see her innards this time! I very much hope to visit her myself in person one of these days. My mom’s fam is from Massachusetts & I’ve lived in the South Jersey/South Philly area most of my life-USS New Jersey, Olympia & the denizens of Battleship Cove are well-known to me and much loved! I’ve always wanted to visit The Texas, though. USS Massachusetts is a perfect snapshot of a Treaty Battleship Era & New Jersey tells a story of how modern BBs evolved into Their Final Form. I like to think of New Jersey and her sisters as the right-side bookends of battleship history. Battleship Texas is the left-side bookmark of Big Gun Battleship Saga, The Last of the Dreadnoughts. Like The Iowas Texas she tells a long story, but hers is the story of the first half of battleship evolution. Like New Jersey & her sisters she’s kitted out with gear from from many years & multiple eras. She’s the first half of the story that The Iowas complete. (The Star Wars fanboy in me likes to think of Battleship Texas as the SW Prequel Era with the Iowas standing in for The Original Trilogy and the Expanded Universe. There is no equivalent to the Star Wars sequels, of course, because the sequels never happened. They were just a terrible dream Grandmaster Luke had one night after drinking some blue milk that had gone off. I suppose if one really wanted to extend the Star Wars analogy you could compare The Sequel Trilogy to the Littoral Combat Ship, the Zumwalts & the Ford class. The QE-class carriers are more like Solo, I think. They still cost too much & don’t deliver much value but they’re only mildly offensive.)
My personal frustration with the cline of USS Texas condition and the rust in particular is that in the early 50's, not too long after she was berthed at San Jacinto, my grandfather, who was one of the leading experts in cathodic protection for corrosion, offered to engineer protection schemes for the hull at no cost. He would volunteer his engineering time, the sacrificial anodes would have come in the form of scrap metal, and the labor was volunteered from his crews in their off time between pipeline projects. He was based out of Houston and lived approximately 18 miles from the ship. This would have been easily accomplished, and was unceremoniously declined by the officials responsible for her maintenance and care.
Good one, Drach! Your photography is excellent, and having many superb photos accompanying your commentary makes for a superb result. One of these days they need to let you shoot one of those big guns. I'm loving those knife switches, too. One thing that comes to mind that I learned doing historic restoration in my career is principle in physics that gravity is not just a good idea, it's the law and it never stops. All that weight topside pressing downward creates a lot of stress the ship is not designed to bear. I wonder how much the main deck has sagged. I would think they would need to remove armor and those turrets to make it easier to jack things back in place. I do wish the restoration crews all the best. Another issue I imagine they are encountering is lead paint and asbestos.
Some of it was negligence, but a lot of it was ignorance. Like they didn't know keeping furl oil in her bunkerage would become so acidic over the years. (Per Ryan of BB New Jersey). It's why Olympia is in such disrepair also. Texas was one of the 1st museum ships.
The USS Texas is a beautiful ship. We have a beach house on Galveston Island and almost every time we go there from Dallas we stop by to see her. It's amazing that men lived on this ship, nothing like a Carrier or Cruiser of today. Bunks and hammocks were stacked in 3's, in some of the worst place's you would want to try to sleep. We went there one time about 6 months after my wife had a miscarriage. They put her on blood thinners and we drove down to have some relaxation time. While on the ship we found a state room that had been set up for guest latter that night. You can book time to stay aboard like Boy Scouts and such. So I locked the door, and we did our thing. Our daughter was conceived that weekend and I like to think it was aboard the Texas. Maybe the only time a life was brought into the world on a Battleship instead of destroying lives.
If this battleship is rocking, don’t come a knocking? I’m a big fan of sex in unconventional locations. Museum ships never crossed my mind. Well done. New bucket list goal set for me.
The Texas Parks and Wildlife Department got ownership of her as a hulk already. The original group that saved her from the breakers were funded the one time but then it has always been a matter of maintenance costs vs budgets of the organization that inherited her. Glad to see that the public is bankrolling the restoration, but the decision to put her back in the water after this work is done means we may be right back here again in 30 years. A real restoration, as the volunteers are finding, was a massive investment and TPWD never had anything like the funds to maintain her.
That is what I was thinking. I believe it might be better to keep her out of the water. Too bad they can not build a giant warehouse museum to put her in like NASA has done for some of its rockets and airplane museums do. It would be nice if Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos or Bill Gates donated the money to build her a museum building.
I dont know how anyone can be mad about her shape. The craft is 110 years old. She has been sitting in a static state for more than 70 years in Salt water. Metal rusts even after just a short time of sitting. Also of note this museum isnt a building that can be easily maintained. Texas is a living museum on water and her past caretakers throughout many years just weren't of the knowledge base to understand the grand scope of her maintenance. Imagine a Sky Scrapper but it floats. Thats the scale of Texas. She will cost 100's of millions too bring back and maintain and will require a refreshment every 10 years or so. Its a grand scale that is subjected too unrelenting weathering conditions. I cant think of another nation that has a floating BB of this era so you cant compare her to other museum ships at all. What we all can agree on is the right people are in charge of her current restoration and in their hands she will be well attended to.
@@rogersmith7396 Yeah, a ship that was buried in an effectively hermetically sealed chamber in a desert. No comparison whatsoever to the challenges of maintaining a ship like Texas.
Thank you, thank you, thank you. I hope you enjoyed our lovely State while you visited but thank you for documenting our lovely Texas getting repaired.
Fascinating look at a relic of ships long gone. I cannot help but admire how they built them and of course fought ships like this. Definitely a ship worth preserving and even in her rather poor state she is magnificent. Thanks for the informative vid, and put that knife switch down!
This ship was one of my grandfathers (who was a Navy man)favorite places to take us in the 70s. Then you could climb in and out of this magnificent ship. I’m so very glad they finally got it dry docked. Thank you for the video.
Nice video again! I have been on the Texas twice, and the time was in 2016 when it was sitting in the water right next to the San Jacinto tower and museum. But at 43:46 or so you show a place in the ship there is a plate partially covering the two chain link chains that go downwards, and you commented on the flash issue it presented, and that you could also lose your foot in the opening. It looks like the plate to the left is flipped over 'incorrectly; and that it looks like it is meant to cover this hole, and just flipping this cover over would fill the gap. The chains look like they would fit into this opening perfectly, and there is even 2 rollers, one per chain, that would roll as the chain moved up or down. Perhaps you could find out?
The statements made about this feature are not correct. Protection was only needed to restrict flash from a powder bag. Those were never allowed in this lower shell hoist or in this particular room. Bags moved up to the turret through a separate hoist that had both flash protection doors and water sprayers that could hose the entire inside height of the hoist if needed. As far as what happened inside this room, flash protection wasn't needed because it was physically impossible for shells to ignite or explode, so that wasn't considered when this ship was design, nor was it a consideration on all ships that followed her. The doors in the photo were only there to keep someone from stepping into an open hole that is the top of the lower shell hoist and being injured. When a shell was lifted by the chain extending through them, its base would push the doors open and it would lift through them. They fell back closed once the shell was clear. The gap that remains when the doors are closed is only wide enough to catch your toe and make you trip, but not step in. By the way, when manned and in operation, there would only be one crew member standing close to the opening, a shell man who transferred the shell to a chain hoist/trolley and pushed it either to the upper hoist or to a storage rack. He would certainly be trained and likely have the muscle memory to avoid tripping on the doors that.
What a great video!!!! One quick point however. When talking about the 3"50 AA guns and the magazines for them, you showed some shells stacked up. Those actually look like 5" shells for the 5"51s. They had seperate shells and powder bags. The 3"50s were all one piece like the 5"25 AA of other BBs of that time. Other then that, this video again was excellent and i absolutely love being able to see the inside of the ship. This is definitely a bucket list stop!!
I toured the Battleship Texas as a kid decades ago and thought it odd this WW2 battleship seemed so outdated, especially with the second deck side guns, not aware it was a WW1 style dreadnought. Now I think it is Avery neat antique. Great video on all these hidden details
Long before I truly understood the importance and history of the ship, we made several visits to the Texas. Back in the early 70s, I spent hours climbing and descending to all parts of the ship. It seemed like everything was open with countless stairs, ladders, levers, dials, and controls to discover. Thank you to all who served on her and who have done so much to maintain her over the years.
Thanks! I just learned that the USS Texas conducted the first ever naval flight of a non-seaplane airplane. It was a Sopwith F.1 Camel that was one of six purchased by the US navy after the First World War. The flight happened in 1919. Awesome history!
Drach was so Englishly polite and soft spoken about not blaming the current regime for Texas’ condition. Here’s the American version....shut your pie holes and don’t blame these guys...they didn’t do it!
@@joebombero1 He will be about to walk around and under the ship, but won't be able to board her. The admiral's cabin and stateroom has served as offices for ship's museum staff for years and will likely continue to serve that function when she finally reopens.
I was able to go onto Texas when I was a child, probably in the mid 70's. It was fascinating, and probably a good part of why I have a fascination with ships, especially battleships. Sadly the only other one I've been on is the Alabama. I'm thrilled to see Texas getting the care she needs.
I've always found it fascinating that Texas and her sister New York were, to my knowledge, the only US battleships that stored their shells nose down in those cups. I'd love to find out if there's a story behind that choice and the change back to storing the shells on their bases. I hope to go see her one more time in dry dock! I hope to tour her in full when she is open again.
I just saw your comment. The unique system was the result of evolution from earlier designs and changing what wasn't working well. The original design for the two ships had their 14" shells stored horizontally on racks like was done with 12" shells on earlier ships. Once moved to the lower hoists, shells were swung to a nose down position so that they could be lifted using removable lifting eyes attached to their bases. That was far easier than trying to swing them to a nose up position. However, their size and weight increase from 860lbs. to 1,400lbs. made handling them that way very difficult. The solution was to change storage and handling in the magazines so that shells were stored vertically and their noses supported by cups (called chocks) welded to the deck. That way, shells could be lifted and carried by the lifting eyes without any big transitions from horizontal to vertical. That design was discarded in later designs since handling systems were completely redesigned so that most shells were stored base down in rings spaced up the turret structure and handled to the hoists using a method called parabuckling.
@Drachinifel That top layer of 'wood' decking you saw where the 5" mount was removed is actually concrete, laid down in the 1960s and brushed to resemble wood. Unfortunately. Texas only actually has one layer of wood decking.
The material directly beneath the 5" gun stands is wood. It was not replaced when concrete was poured because it would have required lifting the guns to do it, which didn't happen. Besides, I've seen where they were removed and know it to be wood. Btw, all of the concrete was removed in 1988-90 and a new wood deck was installed. It has now degraded to the point of requiring replacement and is on the list of things to do.
I was actually surprised how good the condition of some areas of texas look ( boiler room, parts of the engine room ,turrets and the shell handling equipment ) yes its not as good as on the iowas for example and these and other areas need restoration wich would take a long time ,money and a lot of people to work on it . But i think she deserves it and im happy she gets mutch needed attention ,looking forwards of seeing her in the future . COMMON TEXAS ❤
There are some compartments down deep and forward that for what ever reason, experienced little or no water percolating from deck leaks above. They stayed at very low humidity and the WW2 paint is in amazing condition.
Great video Sir and thank you so much in doing part 2 (interior). Hope will be part 3 later maybe when it's time to go back into the water and see the exterior and interiors again as more restoration takes place. Thank to all involved in making the repairs and restoration that was long overdue. God bless you all.
I did an oral history interview for a man who was a gunner on the Nevada. His job was to place the primer for the charge and set it for firing. The primer was a blank 30.06 cartridge set in front of a trigger hammer. The gunner and the primer communicated by foot taps. Gunner foot to primer man's shoulders. Primer man would respond by tapping the gunners shoes on the side. My interviewee ( a Pearl Harbor Survivor ) stated that he had to remain perfectly still when the gun fired so it would not hit him in the face in recoil. Tap signals: Primer man would tap RIGHT shoe when ready to fire. Primer man would tap LEFT shoe after the round was fired. The interview is held at Maag Library at Youngstown State University, Ohio.
I remember when my brother and I were kids we would “shoot up” everything around the ship channel on 1 of the open mounts guns, back then you could raise and traverse the gun by cranking the handle while seated in the original seats. Good times. Watched it come down the ship channel when it returned from its last dry dock 30+ years ago with my then young son. Really impressive seeing it round the bend and seeing it bow on approaching her berth
Today I watched the movie Downfall. It's incredibly amazing that all the events of the world since this ship first joined the fleet have happened in less time than it takes to rust a ship.
@@rogersmith7396 in truth little of what you see is actual Lenin, i was once outside Mao's Mausoleum in Beijing, i thought lets see the old codger, and maybe do a rude gesture towards him, then i looked at the queue and you couldn't even take photos, so i got some dim sum instead, far better option
Texas is a great ship that served in so many historic battles!!! Let donate to help keep her in good condition so the future generations will be able to learn history 1st hand!! I’m 58 and the 1st time I toured her was 1976 as a young boy. Always loved getting to be aboard her! Let lead me to the navy at the age of 18😊🇺🇸👍
As you talked about what you called the 'Analog' feel of USS Texas, how do you recall this "anolog" feel on USS Texas comparing to the Greek armored cruiser Georgios Averof (if you've visited Averof)? I ask because I think Averof was commissioned in the same period of naval history, regardless of being different ship types and from different navies. Were there things that were very similar that you remember and were there things that struck you as very different between the two museum ships?
All the while I was watching that episode I kept thinking of Repulse and Prince of Wales slowly being salvaged by some Chinese salvage company. Can we turn those guns on them? If only...
Pinned post for Q&A :)
A few months ago, I made a question about the proposed Portuguese battleship - in between the end of the War and the WNT, if the Portuguese had the money, what battleship/battle cruiser could have bought, and what upgrades could have receive in the 1930's?
I just had done a bit of research into the 15mm BESA the British licensed produced version of the Czech ZB-60 which came in anto aircraft mounts was any consideration given to using this weapon in the anti aircraft role by the British? Especially given some ships used the 12.7mm Vickers mounts the 15mm BESA has quite superior ballistics and belt fed and a fair bit lighter than the Vickers design
When you come back to America, any plans to come back to NC, they have a full size replica of a Civil War monitor call CSS Neus along with everything left of the original ship when they pulled her from the mud
Was the torpedo pressurization system retained to handle the aviation fuel for scout planes? Not only for moving fuel but purging fuel lines to reduce fire risk.
The reason battleships became non-viable was due to loss of offensive capability as a result of vastly increasing battle ranges (due to aviation), not due to vulnerability. Assuming that weapons that effectively outrange battleship guns such as aircraft never came to exist, how long would it have taken for battleships to have been rendered obsolete due to being too vulnerable to newer weapons?
So glad she's finally in dock for a good bit of repair work, it would be a crime to lose such a historic ship. We're extremely fortunate to have people doing their best to keep her in one piece for years to come.
Uss Texas is the last dreadnought in the world
@@phoenixprime24 Not quite. Japan still has the Mikasa but she is a pre-Dreadnought…
@@allangibson8494 what I mean is that the Texas is the last dreadnought class battleship in the world
@@phoenixprime24 Mikasa is still a dreadnought. Dreadnoughts are a type of battleship; the term "pre-dreadnought" is not a different type of ship, it is just a time periodical name: that being it was built before HMS Dreadnought was built.
@@Train115 mikasa is not a dreadnought as she was built in 1899 and HMS dreadnought was built in 1906
a pre-dreadnought is a battleship built before 1906
Painting a fireplace onto a steel wall of a 30,000 ton Super Dreadnaught is maybe the best expression of the human condition i have seen.
PRIVATE, WHY THE FUCK IS THERE A PEACE SIGN ON YOUR HELMET, PRIVATE??
You know they did it on the USS Arizona the Captain's quarters had a fireplace
@@Nomansland672and looked what happened to the Arizona...is there a connection... probably
@@JayTX. notably the Texas is now the last remaining Dreadnaught and the Arizona exploded in pearl harbor sooooo not sure about that
The last WW1 dreadnought left in the world. Definitely worth saving. Great to see the people of Texas taking care of a national heirloom of a bygone era.
True. However, the Japanese still have the IJN Mikasa Predreadnaught, and the USA still have the 1895 Protected Cruiser USS Olympia
We’re talking “ Dreadnaught”, others neednaught apply…
Move along then…
Doesn't Britain have the og Dreadnought?
@@Da_TboneLife Admiral Fisher's design for HMS Dreadnought is the original for which all other dreadnoughts and super-dreadnoughts are based. HMS Dreadnought herself was scrapped in 1923.
@@daxlucero2437 Texas is the only remaining dreadnought ship and she is the only remaining battleship that was commissioned between 1903 and 1940. And that is not the real Mikasa. That is a mostly reconstruction of "Mikasa". The original Mikasa was sunk and destroyed in an explosion after WWI. There is only about 20% left of the original Mikasa and everything on her is fake like the fiberglass "turrets". Texas OTOH has all her 1910s and 1920s original internal engines and equipment and even 9 out of 10 of the 14" guns on her now were her original 1913 14" guns! They were on Pennsylvania for 15 years before being rotated back onto her in late 1944 where they have been ever since. There are only 15 surviving 14" guns in the world and Texas has 10 of them.
Drachs obsession with knife edge switches and calling for people to pull levers-has given me the slighly worying image of Drach attempting to use kites electricity and a tall tower to attempt to bring warships to life.
Or energize an enormous man made up out of spare parts...
Remember the air powered ones in "Jurasic Park".
"Mwahahahaha! SHE LIIIVES!"
Mel Brooks' "Young Drachinifel" might be the only thing funnier than the existence of the Kamchatka.
A little known fact is that behind the scenes in Iowa’s recent turret rotation was Drach throwing a comically oversized knife edge switch connecting their shore power
It is so fascinating to me how rudimentary everything on Texas is. Compared to an Iowa, its all there: the barbette interior, ready-use shells in the turrets, flash doors, even the hoist for the 3 inch powder. I can see where things like the dredger hoist, shell decks, and the powder passing was evolved from, but its just much older and very first generation compared to an Iowa. Same with the Bureau Express boiler, its so rudimentary and first generation I love it! I plan on visiting Texas when she finds a new home. COME ON TEXAS!
What's also crazy about that is that Texas was a leap ahead of her predecessors in technology and design. She was sometimes called a super-deadnought, and I wonder what a pre-dreadnought battleship would have been like on the inside.
Thanks for the tour. Screw the rust as that can be addressed over time. It's a miracle that the old girl still even exists. It's also fortunate that she was never modernized like the Iowas and still retains that old school battleship ambiance.
But it would be very metal if she was, imagine the Tomahawks and CIWS on her during the 1991 Gulf War.
If the Iowas hadn't been modernized, they'd be razor blades in a city dump, with miscellaneous 'parts-is-parts' laying on some museum's side lawn.
Do you think the 'maritime states' like Iowa, Missouri, or Wisconsin would have cared enough to step up to the plate?
It really would be difficult to modernize her.
Really old school. He shows us bunks. That ship was built when they still used hammocks. Bunks showed up between the wars. USS Tennessee actually had her hammocks at Pearl Harbor. Just like Nelson.
@@georgesoros6415 There are still hammock hooks all over the inside of Texas.
I think the point made in the intro is definitely one worth making. Yes, Texas has got into a terrible condition but then (Taking an example as a Brit) so did HMS Victory, and while I think faceless bureaucratic apathy has certainly played a significant part, a lot of the issues Texas is having are, like Victory, down to the fact no-one has gone through these lessons of how to preserve a ship this big before. USS Olympia and Georgios Averof are probably the next oldest ships and they are a LOT smaller than Texas so simply won't have the same problems as Texas or on the same scale.
In fact, it's probably worth saying that the current volunteer crew are just like anyone else and had been so utterly appalled at how much Texas was suffering, and they've taken action to form the current administration and so they are literally on the same side as anyone else who wants Texas to live on for another hundred years.
I imagine the rest of the Battleship Museum fleet are all watching the lessons of Texas and furiously making notes, which is a nice continuity for Texas herself; she is still informing US Battleship development that leads to the Iowa's, just in museum form than combat form. I'm hopeful those ships, perhaps even something like Salem and Little Rock will be able to learn from Texas and suffer fewer problems of their own because of Texas.
I've been all over the Olympia and its amazing how much the 20 years between her launching and the Texas' launching created a difference in ships. As old as this looks compared to the New Jersey, the Olympia looks that much older than the Texas. Biggest problem Olympia has is her hull is riveted. Dry docks aren't used to dealing with that here so they won't give a repair estimate since they don't want to underbid the work, but the Olympia can't gather funding without a total estimated cost ugh.
a lot of the Brits problem's is their insistence on voting for socialism, leftist's hate a successful western country and seek to minimize the many historic achievements made by the same
My grandfather was a torpedo man on the Texas. Under the forward waterline.
Olympia is older
The state of the art of DC electrical technology on the Texas is from 1912. The components look to be right out of a Frankenstein movie.
gimme those Knife-Switches!!!
Or steam punk there is alot on texas that would make an incredible back drop if your into that.
Hey! When I was a kid, I visited many factories that still had all that stuff working! And I'm not 100!
Of course, it was obsolete, but working! And it was so interesting! Like Drach says, it seems scary, but you could see in a second exactly what was wrong! I'll bet that was handy!
@@mikhailiagacesa3406 And they were still in service in the 1990’s…
@@allangibson8494 yes, and just bit scary.
Those volunteers sound like they went through what the US Navy went through with Congress, with having to do and wanting to do a lot of work but none of the budget to do it, so well done to them for keeping the old girl alive this long.
Yeah the government is good at spending a lot of money in places that have no purpose. Like those LCS ships that they want to scrap and then build new ones.
@@AT-xr8qh the LCS is actually more like the abrum-x it was a test bed for advanced and untested technology think of it like a trial by fire, space x is doing the same thing. It’s important to find fault’s in untested tech before battle, it might not have been the most successful but it wasn’t a waste either.
The Texas legislature is pretty awful, we spend hundreds of millions on a governor’s political stunts but we barely keep this ship from sinking
At one point the state-of-the-art in ship preservation was to stick it in concrete like Mikasa - they avoided that option (thankfully) because it was too expensive. Now that they have the money and the will, they can safely restore it properly. Whether it will sell tickets in this day and age is another question entirely (just ask Szimansky).
@@randbarrett8706 Best Governor ever! Those "political stunts" mean closing off the border from 100s of thousands of illegal aliens poring through, that your President won't address.
I'm very pleased to hear that, vis-a-vis the USS Texas, "the reports of my death are greatly exaggerated." An ironical phrase attributed to a man, who was himself, a Mississippi river pilot.
Not to mention a badass!
“Mark Twain” being the verbal report for a depth sounding of two fathoms..
I made a donation a while back and received a jam nut from one of the 5" guns. It is the centerpiece of my militaria collection.
I am glad there is a significant effort to preserve this ship.
It’s like looking at a preserved ship wreck. Saved from the abyss, and intact. Fascinating.
My grandfather's brother, Joseph Anton Droll, enlisted in the Navy in 1918, at the same time as my grandfather. My grandfather spent WW1 as a deckhand on a transport, and got an expeditious discharge at the end of the war. His brother Joseph decided to stay in and on the 1920 US Census he appears as an Engineman 2nd Class aboard USS Texas. I really appreciate seeing the pictures of the lower half of one of the engines he worked on.
The state of the ship has almost has as much to do with time as it does with money and the know how to apply it. Got to remember, BB-35 was the first museum ship and no one knew how to take care of them or how much money it was going to take. On top of that, the decay of the ship which was held back by a full complement was now being managed by a small skeleton crew of volunteers. I think they did a great job considering what they had to work with.
I agree with you. At the time the took control of the vessel they had to learn as they went on how to to preserve it. Disappointing that Drachfinal didn’t give any kudos to the original staff.
there is a great rundown with the curator of Texas and the curator of New Jersey about what was known when Texas was first turned into a museum ship vs what was done differently when Newjersy was and the Drydocking of Texas was letting them plan for when New Jersey goes in later
This is an OSHA nightmare and I love it. Thank you for bringing this masterpiece to us, Drach.
To be fair she comes from the time before they invented saftey!
In her day you just did dangerous stuff as carefully and intelligently as possible, and natural selection and all that....
Imagine though falling into a switchboard....ooof ... there's not much coming back from that one.....
Not that modern ships are much better, my last ship had some maintenance that had to be done in one case while standing on the rudder ram (which was fun while underway) or in another case directly bellow the main coupling (prop shaft) which like wise was awsome fun with those noce petite 6.5" nuts and bolts whizzing a few inches from your dome. Of course the fiberglass wrapping on the shaft made for a decent back massager at anything below ahead standard, and at about a 2/3 bell it made a decent tread mill as well.....
Saftey frack it! Overrated stuff that, bunch of hog water and a real buzz kill!
To quote another youtuber who discusses railroads he is fond of saying "We died like men back then."
@@White-Wolf1969 that sounds like it might be a Hyce-ism lol
@@White-Wolf1969 that sounds like it might be a Hyce-ism lol
@@jaysonlima7196 correct
I thank you volunteers they are supporting and doing a great job. When i was living in Houston i was eight years old my dad took me on the great USS TEXAS i had a ball,and she was a lot more healthier. I'm so ready to Aboard she again I'm turning 77 in June so i can't wait !❤
I camped out on the Texas as a cub scout years ago. They let us crank the wheels to aim the AA guns at the San Jacinto monument back in the day. Glad she’s getting repairs!
16:10 "I highly doubt anyone will be able to go up or down this without some serious clearing going on."
>> Ryan Szimanski has entered the chat.
I saw her as a boy about 1969. She was in much better shape then. Everything was painted dark blue but the amount of rust was not like this. Still, she will rise again!
The old girl still looks like a frightening piece of weaponry.
Thanks for your excellent doc of BB Texas. As a child I walked and climbed down her gangways, almost falling down some of them. My father kept a hand on the back of my shirt luckily.. Guess it was 54. I was very disappointed when told I couldn't fire the big guns. Not even the 40 mm. Seems like Dad mentioned I was just the right size to fit into the 14in breach... He was there off North Africa and saw the Texas fire. His transport was placed in sight of her in the convoy from the states. Your presentations are always appreciated. Glad to see you bringing attention to ships like the Texas and other important remnants of naval history before its too late. Your efforts will always be appreciated.
On the topic of rust, sometimes it's actually better to leave it alone. Depending on the structure and quality of steel, once a surface has corrosion present, it typically doesn't acquire any more beyond the surface layer. So long as moisture is kept away from it, it will sit quite happily for many years. That's why old airplanes are mothballed in the desert, because while parts of them may acquire a surface level of rust, it rarely penetrates the metals to any depth. That's why when you mothball a ship you seal it up and emplace dehumidifiers everywhere, by removing the interior moisture you preserve the ship without undue expense.
If they are not ready to de-rust and coat each surface with whatever product they use to prevent rust, leaving it alone is often the best choice.
Well, the desert storage question also comes down to the fact that most structural airplane components are aluminum alloys which don't rust.
@@FoxtrotYouniform️ Exactly. Also, aluminum forms a layer of oxide(ie. aluminum oxide, basically aluminum "rust") which acts as an almost impenetrable, protective barrier that dramatically reduces further corrosion. That same concept also applies to other metals, like tin, chromium, zinc, nickel, etc. But that does _not_ apply to naked iron or steel that isn't alloyed with chromium.
Iron oxide(rust) does _not_ form an impenetrable barrier on the surface of steel or iron, so it provides almost no protection against further corrosion.
@@HighlanderNorth1 I'm going to start telling people that the untreated rust on my car is a protective decorative patina
@@FoxtrotYouniform
You may as well leave it there. It's not like anyone's ever seen holes in thin, steel auto body panels caused by rust. Sure there's holes, and sure, there's always lots of rust surrounding the holes, and there's no holes in the areas without rust. But damn if I can figure out what's causing those holes! Lol
Unfortunately ships are not often parked in deserts…
It’s really telling that under the Texas Department of Parks and Wildlife, Battleship Texas had been in the water so long that her frames had rusted to nothing. Within 3 years of the Battleship Texas foundation taking over, she was in drydock getting massive structural repairs.
Its a terrible fact ,that, the old adage, we're from the government, we're here to help! Strikes fear in the historical ship preservation communities 😮😮😮
Knowing Texas it’s very likely they were horribly underfunded and couldn’t do much
Government is AWFUL at EVERYTHING.
@@slytlygufyincorrect. If you don’t pay taxes, they can track you down even if you fall into another dimension.
Texas doesn't believe in government.
It's remarkable the last Dreadnought battleship is still around, the Texas is 110 years old, so it's impressive she has endured the test of time. I have not visited the Texas since 2009, I was part of a tour while I was in the RCN, she was quite impressive, so I hope the Texas will be restored for everyone to marvel at.
My wife and I own a rental property down in Galveston, I get down there about once a month to check up on the house and make my way over to the dockyard afterward. The amount of progress with repairs made between months is astonishing. In regards to how she got to the sad state that she's in, well its been an inter-agency mess over the decades, greed and abuse. At least she's in good hands now, and will be the best she's ever been post WW2.
Time also doesn't help
I remember when i was 10, going to see the Texas and Lexington on a family vacation, they were sure an impressive sight moored within sight of each other.
16:34 If I remember correctly from one of the videos over on the Battleship New Jersey channel, Ryan was talking about something very similar going on with New Jersey's armored trunk, I think it got to the point where one end was mostly blocked off by cabling making it very difficult to actually get out of the shaft on that end.
The men whose battle stations were basically inside the 14-inch guns were their era's real-life equivalents of the guys stationed in the Death Star superlaser subway tunnels. :)
Thanks for the encouragement for us all to donate to Battleship Texas Foundation no matter how small. Made my donation about three weeks ago. If every Drach subscriber could give a dollar, we’d raise $425k. If everyone could even give $10, it’d be $4.25M. Nice tour Drach!
I toured this ship nearly 25 years ago during a very hot Texas August afternoon (hot for someone from southern Ontario, Canada) and it was really heartbreaking to see her listing at her location at San Jacinto so many years later. A salute to those who are striving to keep this old battlewagon intact. She is one of a kind and all of her contemporaries are long gone.
Trust me…….Still just as hot 😄👋🏼😄
Glad I went to see her in Huston before she was moved to dry dock. A very impressive ship, even with the extensive corrosion. Thanks for bringing more attention to her.
I'm 60 years old this year. I went to the USS TEXAS back when I was in the first grade. I was in awe at the size of the ship. Being there awakened my interest in WWII history. I hope they continue to repair and maintain it. It is a shining example of our countries Navy!!! Great video thank you for the info and keep up the great work ❤
My Grandfather was a WW1 US Navy Veteran. He was A Electrcians Mate 1st class. While I don’t know exactly what ship he was on I can only imagine that he was very familiar with those old electrical systems such as these.
Thank you for sharing these videos. They help me reconnect with my family history.
Very cool project. So glad people still care about such important history.
I toured the Texas back in 2000ish, I am hopeful to get to tour it again once she lands a new home. The amount of work needed/being done is mindblowing to me.
Time for you to take a trip back when they move her so you get to see a battleship move on water, or convince Travis to let you on when you move it
Absolute amazement that she is still with us.
Great tour! I think you went places that even the old "Hard Hat" tour didn't go. It was nice too see part of the conning tower, when i visited years ago the upper compartments were screened behind plastic partitions.
Another good video source is from one of the volunteers:
"Tom Scott, the Older One". He has dozens of deep dive videos on Texas. I'm pretty sure that unlike the gun you saw, they have one (I don't know which turret) gun fairly cleaned up and mechanically functional. It's in one of Tom's videos.
they need to give Drach the keys , take it for a cruise.
3:58 i love the fact it's guns are pointed at a cruise ship, too tempting
The restoration team has my respect for tackling such an old vessel. I wish them luck!
As a naturalized Texan, I'm happy for you that you were able to visit this beauty! I'm also happy the government isn't directly responsible for her; otherwise, none of this would have been happening. I hope you're able to be with her on her next journey and hopefully my family can get to go visit her some day.
Amazing. She's beautiful in a terrifying way. Loved the engines. So glad they are saving her.
I still wish Enterprise CVN 65 was saved as a museum ship. She was/is one of the most famous ships.
Can't wait to see the restoration finished
😊
Thank you, Drachinifel.
Thank you for making this video, I last saw Texas in person about 20 years ago, and seeing her as she is now fills me with a broad spectrum of emotions. I have always felt a certain connection to this ship, more so than other museum ships, as my grandfather served aboard her in the late 1920's .
Somewhere on TH-cam is an organization that 3D scanned Texas' triple expansion engine and explains the various parts and how it works. It was very interesting, and quite strange seeing the virtual engine floating in the void of space.
If I remember correctly from my visit in 2019, that scan is available for viewing above those engines. Engines of that type and size only exist in one other place, the bottom of the Atlantic.
Or on the Cruiser Olympia, and Liberty ships John Brown and Jeremiah O'Brian. Those Liberty ships still sail under their power.
Awesome pictures and great tour. On my bucket list is to visit all the US battleships at some point (New Jersey is already checked off). COVID put a crimp in my plans as my trip to USS Alabama was cancelled as a result.
The pictures of the switchboards and Drach's love of knife switches is one of the best parts of the video. Those panels are referred to as live front-open panel systems. They are obviously extremely dangerous, but also the easiest to maintain, repair and generally keep clean. They served for a long time in the fleet (longer than most people would think). USS Vulcan still had a panel like that in the mid 80's before getting it replaced with a closed panel-dead front switchboard after a sailor had been electrocuted. Having panels like that on a big ship like Texas and even Vulcan is one thing, but they were also aboard small ships like the 4 stackers as well and one can imagine that the watch was very attentive to what they were doing while underway in any sort of sea while standing near one of those panels. It was also interesting for me to see the EOT's (Engine order telegraph) and other position repeaters for the guns, etc. Part of my rating in the Navy was to work on that stuff and it is remarkable how little it changed over the years between when Texas was built and the 1980's.
Thanks for sharing Drach and hope you have had very enjoyable visits all over the states. We do seem to have a lot of ships to visit. 😀
Great to see this majestic ship from the inside - thanks Drachinfel!
I love this. My grandfather was on the Texas before the refit. He was an F1 "black gang -no offense) working the engine room using coal. He also helped during the first launch of an aircraft off the turret 2 I believe. He was a boxer and although they now don't have all of them,, his name was on one before 1928. He loved that ship. Thanks for all of the videos. My son has toured it with me in 1996. Awesome.
Nice to see her innards this time! I very much hope to visit her myself in person one of these days. My mom’s fam is from Massachusetts & I’ve lived in the South Jersey/South Philly area most of my life-USS New Jersey, Olympia & the denizens of Battleship Cove are well-known to me and much loved! I’ve always wanted to visit The Texas, though. USS Massachusetts is a perfect snapshot of a Treaty Battleship Era & New Jersey tells a story of how modern BBs evolved into Their Final Form. I like to think of New Jersey and her sisters as the right-side bookends of battleship history.
Battleship Texas is the left-side bookmark of Big Gun Battleship Saga, The Last of the Dreadnoughts. Like The Iowas Texas she tells a long story, but hers is the story of the first half of battleship evolution. Like New Jersey & her sisters she’s kitted out with gear from from many years & multiple eras. She’s the first half of the story that The Iowas complete.
(The Star Wars fanboy in me likes to think of Battleship Texas as the SW Prequel Era with the Iowas standing in for The Original Trilogy and the Expanded Universe. There is no equivalent to the Star Wars sequels, of course, because the sequels never happened. They were just a terrible dream Grandmaster Luke had one night after drinking some blue milk that had gone off. I suppose if one really wanted to extend the Star Wars analogy you could compare The Sequel Trilogy to the Littoral Combat Ship, the Zumwalts & the Ford class. The QE-class carriers are more like Solo, I think. They still cost too much & don’t deliver much value but they’re only mildly offensive.)
My personal frustration with the cline of USS Texas condition and the rust in particular is that in the early 50's, not too long after she was berthed at San Jacinto, my grandfather, who was one of the leading experts in cathodic protection for corrosion, offered to engineer protection schemes for the hull at no cost. He would volunteer his engineering time, the sacrificial anodes would have come in the form of scrap metal, and the labor was volunteered from his crews in their off time between pipeline projects. He was based out of Houston and lived approximately 18 miles from the ship. This would have been easily accomplished, and was unceremoniously declined by the officials responsible for her maintenance and care.
Good one, Drach! Your photography is excellent, and having many superb photos accompanying your commentary makes for a superb result.
One of these days they need to let you shoot one of those big guns.
I'm loving those knife switches, too.
One thing that comes to mind that I learned doing historic restoration in my career is principle in physics that gravity is not just a good idea, it's the law and it never stops.
All that weight topside pressing downward creates a lot of stress the ship is not designed to bear. I wonder how much the main deck has sagged.
I would think they would need to remove armor and those turrets to make it easier to jack things back in place.
I do wish the restoration crews all the best.
Another issue I imagine they are encountering is lead paint and asbestos.
Some of it was negligence, but a lot of it was ignorance. Like they didn't know keeping furl oil in her bunkerage would become so acidic over the years. (Per Ryan of BB New Jersey). It's why Olympia is in such disrepair also. Texas was one of the 1st museum ships.
The USS Texas is a beautiful ship. We have a beach house on Galveston Island and almost every time we go there from Dallas we stop by to see her. It's amazing that men lived on this ship, nothing like a Carrier or Cruiser of today. Bunks and hammocks were stacked in 3's, in some of the worst place's you would want to try to sleep. We went there one time about 6 months after my wife had a miscarriage. They put her on blood thinners and we drove down to have some relaxation time. While on the ship we found a state room that had been set up for guest latter that night. You can book time to stay aboard like Boy Scouts and such. So I locked the door, and we did our thing. Our daughter was conceived that weekend and I like to think it was aboard the Texas. Maybe the only time a life was brought into the world on a Battleship instead of destroying lives.
If this battleship is rocking, don’t come a knocking? I’m a big fan of sex in unconventional locations. Museum ships never crossed my mind. Well done. New bucket list goal set for me.
The Texas Parks and Wildlife Department got ownership of her as a hulk already. The original group that saved her from the breakers were funded the one time but then it has always been a matter of maintenance costs vs budgets of the organization that inherited her. Glad to see that the public is bankrolling the restoration, but the decision to put her back in the water after this work is done means we may be right back here again in 30 years. A real restoration, as the volunteers are finding, was a massive investment and TPWD never had anything like the funds to maintain her.
That is what I was thinking. I believe it might be better to keep her out of the water. Too bad they can not build a giant warehouse museum to put her in like NASA has done for some of its rockets and airplane museums do. It would be nice if Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos or Bill Gates donated the money to build her a museum building.
been listening to this channel for awhile and now i work on a dry dock. keep up the great content!
I dont know how anyone can be mad about her shape. The craft is 110 years old. She has been sitting in a static state for more than 70 years in Salt water. Metal rusts even after just a short time of sitting. Also of note this museum isnt a building that can be easily maintained. Texas is a living museum on water and her past caretakers throughout many years just weren't of the knowledge base to understand the grand scope of her maintenance. Imagine a Sky Scrapper but it floats. Thats the scale of Texas. She will cost 100's of millions too bring back and maintain and will require a refreshment every 10 years or so. Its a grand scale that is subjected too unrelenting weathering conditions. I cant think of another nation that has a floating BB of this era so you cant compare her to other museum ships at all. What we all can agree on is the right people are in charge of her current restoration and in their hands she will be well attended to.
There is a 2000 year old ship sitting next to the Great Pyramid in Egypt.
@@rogersmith7396 Yeah, a ship that was buried in an effectively hermetically sealed chamber in a desert. No comparison whatsoever to the challenges of maintaining a ship like Texas.
@@F-Man Tell it to the Egyptions.
@@F-Man imagine making such a chamber to seal the Texas?
The Greek navy's flagship uncle George is an older steel battleship
I think many people forget just how corrosive salt can be and salt water is no better. I am amazed she isn't in worser shape.
To paraphrase Sacred Cow Shipyards: Salt Water actively hates anything even remotely metal and will endeavor to destroy it at all costs.
Thank you, thank you, thank you. I hope you enjoyed our lovely State while you visited but thank you for documenting our lovely Texas getting repaired.
Fascinating look at a relic of ships long gone. I cannot help but admire how they built them and of course fought ships like this. Definitely a ship worth preserving and even in her rather poor state she is magnificent. Thanks for the informative vid, and put that knife switch down!
This ship was one of my grandfathers (who was a Navy man)favorite places to take us in the 70s. Then you could climb in and out of this magnificent ship. I’m so very glad they finally got it dry docked. Thank you for the video.
Thanks for publicizing our beauty. Texas is very proud of her.
Come on Texas!!!!!!!
Nice video again! I have been on the Texas twice, and the time was in 2016 when it was sitting in the water right next to the San Jacinto tower and museum. But at 43:46 or so you show a place in the ship there is a plate partially covering the two chain link chains that go downwards, and you commented on the flash issue it presented, and that you could also lose your foot in the opening. It looks like the plate to the left is flipped over 'incorrectly; and that it looks like it is meant to cover this hole, and just flipping this cover over would fill the gap. The chains look like they would fit into this opening perfectly, and there is even 2 rollers, one per chain, that would roll as the chain moved up or down. Perhaps you could find out?
The statements made about this feature are not correct. Protection was only needed to restrict flash from a powder bag. Those were never allowed in this lower shell hoist or in this particular room. Bags moved up to the turret through a separate hoist that had both flash protection doors and water sprayers that could hose the entire inside height of the hoist if needed. As far as what happened inside this room, flash protection wasn't needed because it was physically impossible for shells to ignite or explode, so that wasn't considered when this ship was design, nor was it a consideration on all ships that followed her. The doors in the photo were only there to keep someone from stepping into an open hole that is the top of the lower shell hoist and being injured. When a shell was lifted by the chain extending through them, its base would push the doors open and it would lift through them. They fell back closed once the shell was clear. The gap that remains when the doors are closed is only wide enough to catch your toe and make you trip, but not step in. By the way, when manned and in operation, there would only be one crew member standing close to the opening, a shell man who transferred the shell to a chain hoist/trolley and pushed it either to the upper hoist or to a storage rack. He would certainly be trained and likely have the muscle memory to avoid tripping on the doors that.
What a great video!!!! One quick point however. When talking about the 3"50 AA guns and the magazines for them, you showed some shells stacked up. Those actually look like 5" shells for the 5"51s. They had seperate shells and powder bags. The 3"50s were all one piece like the 5"25 AA of other BBs of that time. Other then that, this video again was excellent and i absolutely love being able to see the inside of the ship. This is definitely a bucket list stop!!
😌The fact she is still here at all shows you the quality and strength designed into her from the very beginning.
I toured the Battleship Texas as a kid decades ago and thought it odd this WW2 battleship seemed so outdated, especially with the second deck side guns, not aware it was a WW1 style dreadnought. Now I think it is Avery neat antique. Great video on all these hidden details
Awesome tour of my local Battleship!
14:47 To be fair, I do kinda get what you mean. It's a mechanical battleship, not electro-mechanical like the newer museum ships.
Long before I truly understood the importance and history of the ship, we made several visits to the Texas. Back in the early 70s, I spent hours climbing and descending to all parts of the ship. It seemed like everything was open with countless stairs, ladders, levers, dials, and controls to discover. Thank you to all who served on her and who have done so much to maintain her over the years.
HEY DRACH- Next video is your 1000th video! Any big plans? Congratulations!!
Thanks! I just learned that the USS Texas conducted the first ever naval flight of a non-seaplane airplane. It was a Sopwith F.1 Camel that was one of six purchased by the US navy after the First World War. The flight happened in 1919. Awesome history!
Drach was so Englishly polite and soft spoken about not blaming the current regime for Texas’ condition.
Here’s the American version....shut your pie holes and don’t blame these guys...they didn’t do it!
No wonder we're such a coarse lot!
I was just about to say the same thing...😂😂😂
ROFLOL! Thanks for providing the international community with an accurate, faithful American translation. X-mil.
"Every thing is better in Texas!"
_"We inherited this problem from some incompetents who f*cked it all up before we even got near it."_
I’ll be visiting USS Texas this weekend!
Post a video and try to get access to the Admiral's cabin! Even if it is in ruins I would love to see it!
@@joebombero1 He will be about to walk around and under the ship, but won't be able to board her. The admiral's cabin and stateroom has served as offices for ship's museum staff for years and will likely continue to serve that function when she finally reopens.
I was able to go onto Texas when I was a child, probably in the mid 70's. It was fascinating, and probably a good part of why I have a fascination with ships, especially battleships. Sadly the only other one I've been on is the Alabama. I'm thrilled to see Texas getting the care she needs.
Good to see she's being taken care of just recently got to see the ship from across the channel on a cruise ship.
I really see Texas as restoring a giant Steam Locmotives, especially in terms of rust. Just on a massive scale.
Being next to all those open electrical switches on a rolling pitching ship.... yeah. Those were different times safety wise.
As you come in from your watch on deck in stormy seas.
They say early electricians had a "steep learning curve". The guys with helicopters and 3 million volt transmission lines give me the willies.
Love to see the breechblocks still work! She’s a battleship, so it’s great to see she still has some fight in her.
Supposedly Texas was not disarmed like the 16 inch gun ships, her primary weapons while utterly obsolete and corroded are still live.
I've always found it fascinating that Texas and her sister New York were, to my knowledge, the only US battleships that stored their shells nose down in those cups. I'd love to find out if there's a story behind that choice and the change back to storing the shells on their bases. I hope to go see her one more time in dry dock! I hope to tour her in full when she is open again.
Was probably recommended by the guy who supplied chain hoists haha
I just saw your comment. The unique system was the result of evolution from earlier designs and changing what wasn't working well. The original design for the two ships had their 14" shells stored horizontally on racks like was done with 12" shells on earlier ships. Once moved to the lower hoists, shells were swung to a nose down position so that they could be lifted using removable lifting eyes attached to their bases. That was far easier than trying to swing them to a nose up position. However, their size and weight increase from 860lbs. to 1,400lbs. made handling them that way very difficult. The solution was to change storage and handling in the magazines so that shells were stored vertically and their noses supported by cups (called chocks) welded to the deck. That way, shells could be lifted and carried by the lifting eyes without any big transitions from horizontal to vertical. That design was discarded in later designs since handling systems were completely redesigned so that most shells were stored base down in rings spaced up the turret structure and handled to the hoists using a method called parabuckling.
@Drachinifel That top layer of 'wood' decking you saw where the 5" mount was removed is actually concrete, laid down in the 1960s and brushed to resemble wood. Unfortunately. Texas only actually has one layer of wood decking.
The material directly beneath the 5" gun stands is wood. It was not replaced when concrete was poured because it would have required lifting the guns to do it, which didn't happen. Besides, I've seen where they were removed and know it to be wood. Btw, all of the concrete was removed in 1988-90 and a new wood deck was installed. It has now degraded to the point of requiring replacement and is on the list of things to do.
Much thanks. Incredible tour and narration.
I was actually surprised how good the condition of some areas of texas look ( boiler room, parts of the engine room ,turrets and the shell handling equipment ) yes its not as good as on the iowas for example and these and other areas need restoration wich would take a long time ,money and a lot of people to work on it . But i think she deserves it and im happy she gets mutch needed attention ,looking forwards of seeing her in the future . COMMON TEXAS ❤
There are some compartments down deep and forward that for what ever reason, experienced little or no water percolating from deck leaks above. They stayed at very low humidity and the WW2 paint is in amazing condition.
Great video Sir and thank you so much in doing part 2 (interior). Hope will be part 3 later maybe when it's time to go back into the water and see the exterior and interiors again as more restoration takes place. Thank to all involved in making the repairs and restoration that was long overdue. God bless you all.
Right after her last dry docking my cousin and I climbed into turret one and got down into the station under the starboard gun. It was very tight.
02:40 "It's reasonable to be slightly angry about the fact that Texas is in the State that she's in"
So many ways you can take that! 😂
Indeed, as the State of Texas was responsible for the ship.
I did an oral history interview for a man who was a gunner on the Nevada. His job was to place the primer for the charge and set it for firing. The primer was a blank 30.06 cartridge set in front of a trigger hammer. The gunner and the primer communicated by foot taps. Gunner foot to primer man's shoulders. Primer man would respond by tapping the gunners shoes on the side. My interviewee ( a Pearl Harbor Survivor ) stated that he had to remain perfectly still when the gun fired so it would not hit him in the face in recoil. Tap signals: Primer man would tap RIGHT shoe when ready to fire. Primer man would tap LEFT shoe after the round was fired. The interview is held at Maag Library at Youngstown State University, Ohio.
I remember when my brother and I were kids we would “shoot up” everything around the ship channel on 1 of the open mounts guns, back then you could raise and traverse the gun by cranking the handle while seated in the original seats. Good times. Watched it come down the ship channel when it returned from its last dry dock 30+ years ago with my then young son. Really impressive seeing it round the bend and seeing it bow on approaching her berth
Today I watched the movie Downfall. It's incredibly amazing that all the events of the world since this ship first joined the fleet have happened in less time than it takes to rust a ship.
What a wonderful ship to tour.
18:57- You mean the lower deckers slept in the hallways like on the U.S.S. Cerritos? :D
Amazing ship, thanks for the visit 😀
Sounds like a wager for the ages:
Who will preserve for longer - Lenin or Texas?
You're comparing someone that's small to something that's massive.
Ships are usually hard to maintain.
not sure how much of Lenin is still Lenin
I heard Lenin was falling apart, maybe beyond repair.
Bring in Madame Toussads.
@@rogersmith7396 in truth little of what you see is actual Lenin, i was once outside Mao's Mausoleum in Beijing, i thought lets see the old codger, and maybe do a rude gesture towards him, then i looked at the queue and you couldn't even take photos, so i got some dim sum instead, far better option
Texas is a great ship that served in so many historic battles!!!
Let donate to help keep her in good condition so the future generations will be able to learn history 1st hand!!
I’m 58 and the 1st time I toured her was 1976 as a young boy.
Always loved getting to be aboard her!
Let lead me to the navy at the age of 18😊🇺🇸👍
As you talked about what you called the 'Analog' feel of USS Texas, how do you recall this "anolog" feel on USS Texas comparing to the Greek armored cruiser Georgios Averof (if you've visited Averof)? I ask because I think Averof was commissioned in the same period of naval history, regardless of being different ship types and from different navies. Were there things that were very similar that you remember and were there things that struck you as very different between the two museum ships?
Haven't been to Averoff yet but really want to
Thanks for the video. Enjoyed, Been visiting the BattleShip Texas for decades. Very glad to see the repairs.
Absolutely fascinating, and great video. Thank you, Drach!
I love the Emperor's New Groove reference. I appreciate the humor.
THANK YOU DRACH! THIS WAS AN AWESOME VIDEO - FASCINATING AND SO WELL PRESENTED!
EXCELLENT! She looks pretty good for her age, can't wait to see her final refloating!
Thank you for going into the engine room and other places I couldn't go into when I was there because I'm rather rotund.
All the while I was watching that episode I kept thinking of Repulse and Prince of Wales slowly being salvaged by some Chinese salvage company.
Can we turn those guns on them?
If only...