Andrea Doria

[Heidi13]

22 hours ago, CGTNORMANDIE said:

Hi RKA,

While I was digging up the info on LDV I found out the reason why LDV could never be profitable...she was a fuel hog.  Evidently, after she was built, she was deemed a bit unstable in rough seas so they added something like 200 tons of steel in her bottom and that put a drag on her speed and caused her to guzzle fuel.  Her engines did not handle the extra load with fuel efficiency.  They had built her with the intention of converting to nuclear power so I don’t think that they gave too much thought to fuel consumption.  Remember fuel was selling for little money when she was built and then sky rocketed in 1974.  So sad...but all we can do now is collect some of the memorabilia so we can remember the past.

Believe she was built with steam turbines, which were highly inefficient. The extra ballast would increase the draught, so she may have required 4 rather than 3 boilers to maintain speed.

 

Most of my time on steam ships we only had 3 boilers running, but recall a full speed run on Oriana with every fire lit on all 4 boilers. While we hit 32 kts, she burned over 500 tons of fuel per day, which is more than double what most modern ships use.🙂

[CGTNORMANDIE]

1 hour ago, Heidi13 said:

Believe she was built with steam turbines, which were highly inefficient. The extra ballast would increase the draught, so she may have required 4 rather than 3 boilers to maintain speed.

 

Most of my time on steam ships we only had 3 boilers running, but recall a full speed run on Oriana with every fire lit on all 4 boilers. While we hit 32 kts, she burned over 500 tons of fuel per day, which is more than double what most modern ships use.🙂

Thanks Heidi!

[rkacruiser]

22 hours ago, CGTNORMANDIE said:

Go for it...life is too short.  I am in “dry dock” for the time being.  I have dialysis three times a week.  Hopefully I will be able to cruise again in 2020...fingers crossed.

 

I sailed on a HAL ship, the Veendam, I think.  One of my table mates was a doctor who worked for an organization that provided services for guests requiring dialysis.  He was kept busy during our cruise.  Are you aware of that possibility?

[CGTNORMANDIE]

37 minutes ago, rkacruiser said:

 

I sailed on a HAL ship, the Veendam, I think.  One of my table mates was a doctor who worked for an organization that provided services for guests requiring dialysis.  He was kept busy during our cruise.  Are you aware of that possibility?

Thanks RKA,

i am very aware but the logistics just don’t work for me.  I would rather wait until I can once again enjoy a cruise while I take my new kidney for a test ride.  I will get to see how resistant it is to alcohol...LOL!

[rkacruiser]

7 minutes ago, CGTNORMANDIE said:

Thanks RKA,

i am very aware but the logistics just don’t work for me.  I would rather wait until I can once again enjoy a cruise while I take my new kidney for a test ride.  I will get to see how resistant it is to alcohol...LOL!

 

 

You will be in my prayers!

[CGTNORMANDIE]

2 minutes ago, rkacruiser said:

 

 

You will be in my prayers!

Thanks so much...

[chengkp75]

On 5/30/2019 at 12:09 AM, rkacruiser said:

 

Thanks for this information.  Converting her to nuclear power?  That was certainly a leap into the future for that time!  And still is.  LNG seems to be the "wave of the future" now.  If I am still able to cruise, one on the new Carnival Mardi Gras sailings out of Port Canaveral during her inaugural season is something that I would like to do.

Not sure that Shell has taken delivery of the LNG barge for Carnival.  And, anyway, the barge only holds about 4000 cubic meters of LNG (1700-1900 metric tons), while that same volume of diesel (4000 m3) is around 3400 metric tons, and the diesel provides nearly 50% more energy than the same volume of LNG.  Since ship's storage is based on volume, the equivalent volume of LNG gives 2/3 the energy (meaning more fuel volume needs to be burned to move the ship an equal distance), so I doubt the ship will have sufficient LNG for a full week's cruise, and will be running on diesel or residual fuel when outside the North American ECA.  If the Mardi Gras does short 4-5 day itineraries, with lots of port time, they might make it round trip.

[chengkp75]

On 5/30/2019 at 8:21 PM, Heidi13 said:

Believe she was built with steam turbines, which were highly inefficient. The extra ballast would increase the draught, so she may have required 4 rather than 3 boilers to maintain speed.

 

Most of my time on steam ships we only had 3 boilers running, but recall a full speed run on Oriana with every fire lit on all 4 boilers. While we hit 32 kts, she burned over 500 tons of fuel per day, which is more than double what most modern ships use.🙂

Steam ships were all the rage until shortly after WWII.  At that point, when most of Europe's merchant fleet lay at the bottom of the ocean, labor was cheap and fuel was expensive, Europe went to diesel propulsion.  In the US, post war, labor was expensive, and fuel was cheap, so they tended to stay with steam turbines.  Liners stayed with turbines because there were no diesels large enough to provide the power needed to make the speeds required.  Steam ships, due to the requirement to condense the steam back to water, rejecting that heat energy into the sea, tend to be about 65% in overall energy efficiency.  Modern diesel plants reach 85-90% efficiency, though cruise ships tend not to fit all the required efficiency measures.  It was when the Arab fuel embargo happened in the 70's that the US joined the rest of the world and converted to diesel ship propulsion, and the day of the steam ship, with the exception of LNG tankers, ended.

[rkacruiser]

1 hour ago, chengkp75 said:

I doubt the ship will have sufficient LNG for a full week's cruise, and will be running on diesel or residual fuel when outside the North American ECA.  If the Mardi Gras does short 4-5 day itineraries, with lots of port time, they might make it round trip.

 

Interesting information.  I did not realize that a LNG fueled ship could also use any other fuel.  

[chengkp75]

1 hour ago, rkacruiser said:

 

Interesting information.  I did not realize that a LNG fueled ship could also use any other fuel.  

All of the LNG fueled ships use what is known as a "dual fuel" engine.  This engine can burn either gaseous or liquid fuels, in virtually any combination from 100% liquid to 95% gaseous.  The reason they can't burn 100% LNG is that the "auto-ignition" temperature (temp at which fuel will ignite without a flame) is about 600*C, while diesel fuel is about 210*C.  Buses and trucks that run on natural gas have spark ignition engines to ignite the fuel, while marine diesels use 5% diesel fuel injected into the combustion chamber to get the combustion rolling, since the diesel fuel will ignite from the heat of compression of the air (the theory of a diesel engine).

 

The IMO's Safe Return to Port requirements also require an LNG passenger ship to have a supply of diesel fuel onboard should there be a problem with the LNG fuel handling equipment.

[rkacruiser]

36 minutes ago, chengkp75 said:

The IMO's Safe Return to Port requirements also require an LNG passenger ship to have a supply of diesel fuel onboard should there be a problem with the LNG fuel handling equipment.

 

That is reassuring to know.  Thank you!

[Heidi13]

5 hours ago, chengkp75 said:

Steam ships were all the rage until shortly after WWII.  At that point, when most of Europe's merchant fleet lay at the bottom of the ocean, labor was cheap and fuel was expensive, Europe went to diesel propulsion.  In the US, post war, labor was expensive, and fuel was cheap, so they tended to stay with steam turbines.  Liners stayed with turbines because there were no diesels large enough to provide the power needed to make the speeds required.  Steam ships, due to the requirement to condense the steam back to water, rejecting that heat energy into the sea, tend to be about 65% in overall energy efficiency.  Modern diesel plants reach 85-90% efficiency, though cruise ships tend not to fit all the required efficiency measures.  It was when the Arab fuel embargo happened in the 70's that the US joined the rest of the world and converted to diesel ship propulsion, and the day of the steam ship, with the exception of LNG tankers, ended.

Chief - the few cargo ships I served on as a cadet were all diesel, but the UK built passenger ships were all steam until almost the 1970's, at least with P&O and Cunard - Uganda 1952, Arcadia 1953, Nevasa 1955, Oriana 1959,  Canberra 1960 and although I never worked Cunard, I recall seeing QE2 being launched in 1967.

[CGTNORMANDIE]

17 minutes ago, Heidi13 said:

Chief - the few cargo ships I served on as a cadet were all diesel, but the UK built passenger ships were all steam until almost the 1970's, at least with P&O and Cunard - Uganda 1952, Arcadia 1953, Nevasa 1955, Oriana 1959,  Canberra 1960 and although I never worked Cunard, I recall seeing QE2 being launched in 1967.

Hi Heidi,

Most Of The passenger vessels that were built until the 1970’s were steam turbines.  The transition to diesel passenger vessels happened because there was no longer a need for speed.  The old express liners no longer needed to reach 30 knots in order to arrive on time.  The airlines made that possible.  Today’s ships rely on jet engines to generate electricity to the azipods.  

[chengkp75]

1 hour ago, Heidi13 said:

Chief - the few cargo ships I served on as a cadet were all diesel, but the UK built passenger ships were all steam until almost the 1970's, at least with P&O and Cunard - Uganda 1952, Arcadia 1953, Nevasa 1955, Oriana 1959,  Canberra 1960 and although I never worked Cunard, I recall seeing QE2 being launched in 1967.

As I said, the passenger ships required so much horsepower (look at the SSUS, with 240,000 shp) that diesels were not considered practical.  Now, with the very large slow speed engines coming in at 109,000 shp, you can almost match the SSUS with her multiple screws.  Of course, the size of these engines do not lend themselves to cruise ship layouts either (26 meters long and 13.5 meters high), so the diesel electric drive has become the standard for cruise ships.

[chengkp75]

1 hour ago, CGTNORMANDIE said:

Hi Heidi,

Most Of The passenger vessels that were built until the 1970’s were steam turbines.  The transition to diesel passenger vessels happened because there was no longer a need for speed.  The old express liners no longer needed to reach 30 knots in order to arrive on time.  The airlines made that possible.  Today’s ships rely on jet engines to generate electricity to the azipods.  

There are only a few ships that use gas turbines to generate electricity.  While the QM2 has a total installed power of 117Mw, only about half of that is from gas turbines, and a ship like Oasis of the Seas generates 83% of QM2's power strictly by diesels.  And the gas turbines are extremely fuel inefficient compared to diesels.

 

Even the QE2, which started life as a steam ship, when converted to diesel electric could still make 34 knots.  The real reason for the conversion to diesel, as evidenced quite nicely by QE2 was the cost of fuel, and the relative efficiency of steam to diesel.

[Heidi13]

59 minutes ago, CGTNORMANDIE said:

Hi Heidi,

Most Of The passenger vessels that were built until the 1970’s were steam turbines.  The transition to diesel passenger vessels happened because there was no longer a need for speed.  The old express liners no longer needed to reach 30 knots in order to arrive on time.  The airlines made that possible.  Today’s ships rely on jet engines to generate electricity to the azipods.  

Don't have any experience with US tonnage, but in UK, I concur our pax ships changed to diesel, when the ships were built for cruising rather than liner voyages. The Spirit of London (Sun Princess) & Cunard Countess/Princess were some of the first. They were also smaller at 700-1,000 pax than the liners. Although they purchased Princess, P&O didn't build another ship until Royal in 1984.

 

Few cruise ships have gas turbines due to the huge fuel cost. Of the ships I sailed on, only Island/Coral & Diamond/Sapphire Princess had GT and they were rarely used.

 

Even the large High Speed Craft (1,000 pax + 250 vehicles) I worked on had diesels (4 x V20 MTU) rather than GT. Although under-powered, I did hit 45 kts one night.

[CGTNORMANDIE]

7 hours ago, Heidi13 said:

Don't have any experience with US tonnage, but in UK, I concur our pax ships changed to diesel, when the ships were built for cruising rather than liner voyages. The Spirit of London (Sun Princess) & Cunard Countess/Princess were some of the first. They were also smaller at 700-1,000 pax than the liners. Although they purchased Princess, P&O didn't build another ship until Royal in 1984.

 

Few cruise ships have gas turbines due to the huge fuel cost. Of the ships I sailed on, only Island/Coral & Diamond/Sapphire Princess had GT and they were rarely used.

 

Even the large High Speed Craft (1,000 pax + 250 vehicles) I worked on had diesels (4 x V20 MTU) rather than GT. Although under-powered, I did hit 45 kts one night.

 

 

Thanks Cheng and Heidi,

So true, I should have prefaced my remark by saying some ships rely on jet engines. I believe RCI, Princess and others built series of ships with GT.  The QE2 is a fine example of diesel conversion. (QE2 always had problems with her steam turbines).  

Wow...45 knots!  Hard to believe the SS United States could do that in the 1950’s!  

[chengkp75]

The thing you have to realize about the SSUS is that she was being pushed well past her "hull speed".  Exceeding hull speed requires phenomenal amounts of energy.  To continue the analogy, QM2 has a displacement of 79,000 tons and requires 86Mw to push her at 30 knots.  The SSUS only weighed 47,000 tons maximum (60% of QM2), but required 180Mw (twice the power) to push her at 35 knots.

[Amdcu93]

On a side note, for any cruisers really interested in the history of the Andrea Doria... Her antagonist is still in service!

 

The former Stockholm has undergone many name, owner, and appearance changes in the last 60 years, but is still afloat and working as a small-line cruise ship. Her current name in the MV Astoria, and she sails for Cruise & Maritime voyages (granted, they don't cover her past life in their marketing). But if any are interested in sailing on this interesting piece of history, she's still around.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MV_Astoria

[Heidi13]

7 hours ago, CGTNORMANDIE said:

 

The QE2 is a fine example of diesel conversion. (QE2 always had problems with her steam turbines).  

 

Didn't want to mention that as being one of the reasons for her conversion to diesel, but yes, we may have left her in our wake a few times, as she limped up the channel.😀

 

During the Falklands Campaign, she was never brought close to the islands, while Canberra was brought into San Carlos Bay to discharge the troops. I believe QE2 was kept out at South Georgia and her troops moved to another ship.

[chengkp75]

On 5/23/2019 at 2:38 AM, CGTNORMANDIE said:

Great discussion...

I agree with all the above...it was a radar assisted collision...and yes..I have the book. The one thing that sticks out in my mind is how far out of the normal lane the Stockholm was.  Stockholm was in the wrong lane.  I do not think that (Carstens?) was telling the story accurately...just my opinion.

It's been years since I studied the Doria/Stockholm, and haven't read this book, but I have a problem with "in the wrong lane".  In 1956, there were no traffic separation schemes, so there was no "lane" for the Stockholm or the Doria to be in.  There may have been traditional and customary routes used by most ships, but the "lanes" of traffic separation schemes that we see today were brought into existence in 1967, partly as a result of the Doria/Stockholm incident.

[CGTNORMANDIE]

3 hours ago, chengkp75 said:

It's been years since I studied the Doria/Stockholm, and haven't read this book, but I have a problem with "in the wrong lane".  In 1956, there were no traffic separation schemes, so there was no "lane" for the Stockholm or the Doria to be in.  There may have been traditional and customary routes used by most ships, but the "lanes" of traffic separation schemes that we see today were brought into existence in 1967, partly as a result of the Doria/Stockholm incident.

According to the books I have read the lanes were there by agreement.  Stockholm was too far north.  I believe that lanes were formally established around the time you have quoted.  I think there were a lot of times when ships bound for Scandinavia  in slower ships would cut miles off by clipping the lanes if the weather was good.  Remember the Stockholm had sailed out of New York in clear weather.  If you get to see the actual maps you will see what I am saying.

[marco]

My grandparents and great aunt and uncle were on the last eastbound sailing on the AD.  I have a ships photo of them at dinner in the dining room, an ashtray, menus and a few other pieces of memorabilia from the ship. They were supposed to return on it in Sept, but were put on the Columbo.  I've sailed a few times on the LDV, and it was my favorite.  I think wasn't the cargo liner "Savannah"  a nuclear powered ship and built around the same time as the LDV?  They probably thought that was going to be the wave of the future and the ship could easily be converted. 

 

Edited June 6, 2019 by marco

[CGTNORMANDIE]

On 6/6/2019 at 3:26 PM, marco said:

My grandparents and great aunt and uncle were on the last eastbound sailing on the AD.  I have a ships photo of them at dinner in the dining room, an ashtray, menus and a few other pieces of memorabilia from the ship. They were supposed to return on it in Sept, but were put on the Columbo.  I've sailed a few times on the LDV, and it was my favorite.  I think wasn't the cargo liner "Savannah"  a nuclear powered ship and built around the same time as the LDV?  They probably thought that was going to be the wave of the future and the ship could easily be converted. 

 

Hi Marco,

Great you have the AD memorabilia from your grandparents and that you sailed on LDV.  Yes the Savannah was the first commercial cargo ship with nuclear power.  The LDV was actually designed to be converted to nuclear.  This is why I do not think they put too much thought into thr steam turbines she sailed with.  The thoughts of running a reactor onboard a passenger ship at that time scares me.

[rkacruiser]

On 6/7/2019 at 10:19 PM, CGTNORMANDIE said:

The thoughts of running a reactor onboard a passenger ship at that time scares me.

 

Using LNG on some of the newest cruise vessels concerns me as well.