Part of the
Acorn Archive
Hearts of Oak
Athel Line
Ships
Elysia
ELYSIA
ON 304192
Built 1965
Hawthorn Leslie Shipbuilders Ltd., Newcastle.
Yard Nr. 745
For Athel Line Ltd.
8,531 grt; 4,542 net; 11,360 dwt
485ft 6ins x 63ft 2ins x 39ft
Engine Stork HOTLo notes below by Fairfield-Rowan Ltd, Glasgow.
9,000 bhp; 16.25 knots.
1967 Registered
to Anchor Line Ltd.
Duncan
Haws writes - ELYSIA Built 1965 for Athel Line but transferred for operating by
their subsidiary,
the
Anchor Line. 1967 sold to Anchor Line and resold to Strick Line. In August 1953
all of Anchor's
preference
shares were taken up by United Molasses and the company became a wholly owned
subsidiary.
1965
when Athel Line became a subsidiary of Tate & Lyle, the shares of Anchor
Line were re-acquired by Runcimans Moor Line.
Anchor
Line ships are at http://www.theshipslist.com/ships/lines/anchor.html
1968 Sold Strick Line
Ltd. Renamed ARMANISTAN.
1972 Managed by
P&O General Cargo.
1973 Registered
Peninsular & Oriental Steam Navigation Co.
1975 Renamed
STRATHAVOCH.
1978 Sold Hong
Kong Ocean Shipping Co. Ltd., Panama;
Renamed
SHARP ISLAND.
1983 Sold for
demolition; China Dismantled Vessel Trading Corporation, Taiwan.
1983 Scrapped by
Chien Yu Steel Industrial Co. Ltd. Kaohsiung.
Elysia as Armanistan
ELYSIA had two “elder” sisters. SIDONIA and SICILIA. Both
built 1961 in Holland for Anchor Line.
SIDONIA
was sold to the China Navigation Co., in 1967 and renamed HUPEH.
Lengthened
in Hong Kong in 1976 for the carriage of containers and unitised cargo.
Traded
New Zealand to Manila, Hong Kong and Taiwan until 1978. Sold 1979.
see http://www33.brinkster.com/lduive15/scheepje/s/sidonia1.htm
SICILIA became the ANAT.
Stork HOTLo Engines
ELYSIA / STRATHAVOCH
Alistair Stevenson writes …
I was a young 4th engineer on this vessel (MV
Strathavoch) from July to December in 1977.
She was in fact powered by a STORK type HOTLo slow speed 2 stroke Single
Acting oil engine
manufactured under licence by Fairfield-Rowan. This was
an excellent engine with a number
of truly outstanding features which unfortunately
were compromised by the licencee.
I believe they only built two of these engines before
they lost the licence.
Where
Strathavoch's engine differed from a Stork built engine was in some details.
For
example the crosshead bearings were of standard "marine type" with
two separate "bottom halves".
However
they were fitted with Stork high pressure pumps.
A
genuine Stork had a one piece
"bottom half" which was unique at the time.
In
addition the removeable lower section of cylinder liner which was used for inspection
and piston
ring
changes was a plain stepped joint whereas a Stork built engine had a wave
joint.
Other
differences were minor but infuriating. One I remember well was found after opening
up
No
5 'bottom end' bearing for survey.
Routine job, follow instructions in the manual.
These
were genuine Stork and excellent. On
inspection the bearing was found to be scuffed.
Basically
the clearance had been set too tight on an earlier occasion.
The
surveyor was not concerned about it and only required it to be cleaned up.
All
went well until we had to 'blue in' the bottom half which required it to be turned over and
lowered
on to the crankpin. No lifting holes, which the manual clearly showed!
To cut a long story short it caused us a
great deal of trouble as these bearings were massive and a
'Heath-Robinson'
device had to be made up in order to do the job.
On
inspection, none of the other 'bottom ends' had them either. The Chief was incandescent!
All
in all it was an excellent engine and for the life of me I cannot understand
why
it
was not more popular. To my mind it
completely outclassed the contemporary
RD
Sulzer and gave certainly gave B&W something to ponder over.
Nedlloyd
had a number of HOTLo engines in their fleet which gave first class
service
according to the engineers I met.
SIDONIA’s
engines
Joe
Freeman writes ….
Fairfield-Rowan
built a STORK engine for the MV SIDONIA which was built on the Tyne.
This
engine was assembled and tested at David Rowan's engine shop in Finnieston.
I
believe the engine number was 797 and it was a six cylinder four valve
reversing engine with separate
cams
for Ahead and Astern.
The
engine was originally contracted to Fairfield Engine works in Govan and was
transferred to Rowan's in exchange for a 10RD76 Sulzer engine for Ben Line
Steamers MV BENVALLA.
The
testing capacity at Rowan's was limited by the cooling water capacity for the
Dynamometer
and
engine cooling. This was just about the time David Rowan and Fairfield
amalgamated in 1963.
Most
of the main engine components came from the Stork Works in Holland.
The
Fuel Pump casings and Reversing gear were machined at Rowans I know because I
assembled them.
The
Cylinder Heads were individual four valve poppet type valves.
The
cylinders walls were chrome plated and were split for ease of inspection and
replacement.
I
believe the Turbochargers were Brown & Boveri.
One
unique thing that I remember was on top of each crosshead there was a small
lever
driven
piston oil pump that delivered about 50cc of high press oil into each lower
crosshead
bearing
just as it reached TDC. I also installed some cable controls to the governor I
think.
Beyond
that she was a sweet running engine on the test bed and as far as I remember
the
test
engineers from Holland were quite satisfied with the performance.
Raymond
Forward
Thanks to
Alistair Stevenson and Joe Freeman