Topic starter
24/09/2007 2:35 pm
Steamboating colleagues:
Some months back a thread opened here on techniques/products used in lubricating steamboat engines etc. S&D's Prof. Jack White, retired from the Smithsonian Institution and now at Miami University, Oxford, OH., responded to me with an incredibly interesting and well researched paper for the 'Newcomen Society for the History of Engineering and Technology,' London, England, 2004. Jack's nine page article includes some 41 detailed 'Notes & References.' Though titled, 'Some Notes on Early Railway Lubrication,' Jack does touch on steamboat/steamship engine lubrication. Pictures of period oil cups and lubricating devices are shown. He dispels the myth of common 'Breakdowns' indicating that lubrication was a well developed science early on for locomotives. No doubt things did happen by nature or due to careless engineers and 'oilers.' Constant care and attention promoted a well-running set of steamboat engines. I have a video from STEAMSHIP HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF AMERICA in which a surviving engineer on big walking beam engines discussed, "'Constantly watching, listening, touching and smelling a working engine to detect problems...they demanded constant attention and were labor intensive." With good attention, maintenance steamboat engines, as we know, run for years.
On steamers the engineers often gathered from the cook house [Or restaurants ashore] a supply of animal fat. Suet was free from lime and acids. Tallow, and others, worked in hot situations and evaporated at a slower rate. In the Civil War bacon fat was found to work well and was cheaper. Whale oil was used on some southern railways. Other natural lubrication products were: olive oil, 'plumbago' extracted from the tropical leadwort plant. The Chief Engineer of the French Navy concluded that very pure olive oil was superior for steam engines with realized fuel economy. Many of these practices continued well after the growth of the petroleum industry. There was a decided surge in the whale oil industry again in the 1880s for a time for engines and other high precision equipment and tools.
John Burns, son of old Jim Burns who built the DELTA KING/DELTA QUEEN, related to me before his death that on C.T. Co. boats on the Sacramento all food grease and fat was carefully saved in big containers from the cook houses. He never elaborated and now I wonder if it wasn't to use again in cooking or saved for the engineers? Who knows at this late date? Forget to ask one simple question and the answer is often gone...PFFT...forever.
Jack humorously mentions the distinct smell like cooking in the use of a number of the products above. How many here have watched a steamboat engineer walk out and tenderly put his hand on the revolving crank as the wheel revolves around?
Thanks to Jack for his terrific monograph.
Cheers,
R. Dale Flick
24/09/2007 5:01 pm
Dale,
Thanks for the post -- most interesting.
I wonder if the cooking oils on the CTCo. boats were not saved for sale to some sort of rendering plant ashore? When I was in high school and worked at Krystal restaurant, we saved all the oil and grease in a big drum and it was picked up periodically by a company that bought it and used it in who-knows-what appilcation(s). Apparently this was a cost effective thing even in the 1970's; I'm sure it was (maybe even more so?) in the late 1920's and during the depression.
Topic starter
24/09/2007 8:16 pm
Hi, Bob:
Good point about the 'rendering plants' ashore for fats, grease, tallow. Here in Cincinnati soap making was/is big business with P&G, AVON and JERGENS. The DARLING CO. still collects animal fats/by-products for rendering, purification and reuse. Big money in a very dirty, stinky product. Jack White's treatise is interesting when he mentions steamboat engineer collecting fats from restraunts ashore. Appears the fat business went both ways.
John Burns never elaborated on the practice aboard the CALIFORNIA TRANSORTATION CO. steamboats on the Sacramento but indicated it had been done for years even before his time. By the 1920's I'm fairly certain that high grade conventional petroleum products were used on the boats. One thing John did say was that the food was so good and rich on C.T. Co. boats that the officers and crew were walking examples. His own dad, old Jim Burns, was slim and trim all of his life to age 88 and shunned the rich foods on the boats when aboard on business. The C.T. Co. boats also burned fuel oil earlier than many other steamboat lines relying on conventional coal. John said that when the company paid the local California refinery the bill each month, "The refinery declared a dividend to the stock holders." John Burns was a licensed fireman on the boats under his dad in his early years. He then moved on with his education and formed his own engineering company BURNS ENGINEERING in Oakland, California dealing with marine engines in addition to reworking cylinders in U.S, Navy subs and surface ships for added life. Not to repeat from previous postings, but when John talked about the boats on the Sacramento he always used the term "ships" as that was common usage in those waters.
Cheers,
R. Dale Flick