SHIPPING NOTES.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXVI, Issue 44, 21 February 1905, Page 2

SHIPPING NOTES.

VESSELS FOR NEW ZEALAND.

(From Our Special Correspondent.)

LONDON, January 13,

For the first, time since 1900 there is an increase in the tonnage on hand in the shipbuilding yards on the Clyde. The figures, based on- careful- calculations made in the different centres, work out at about 468.800 tons, inclusive of warships. Several of the orders now being [executed on the Clyde are for New Zealand., At Dumbarton Messrs Denny and Bros, are building a large turbine steamer for the Union Steamship Co.. to be used in the inter-colenial* trade. It will be fitted with Parsons turbines, manufactured by Denny a.nd Co., an<l will develop a high speed. The same firm have also on the stocks a small steamer for New Zealand owners. Denny and Bros, have been engaged principally on turbine steamers during the past year, and in the coming year they are likely v to be engaged very largely on the same type of -vessel. Denny and Co., the well-known engineers, have also been busy with mariue steam turbines, for the manufacture of vrliich they Jiave built a large hew shop. At Port Glasgow Messrs D. j< Dunlop and Co. are building three light draught steamers for thcf Northern Steamship Co. of New Zea-

land. The outstanding feature of the past year in the shipbuilding and engineering trades, has undoubtedly been the progress of the marine steam turbine. Messrs Denny and Bros, launched seven J turbine steamers in' 1904. and one of I them, the Loongana, made the voyage to Australia at a little over 16 knots per ihour in a thoroughly satisfactory manner. ; This is the longest voyage yet undertaken by a turbine steamer, although the Turbinia, built at. Newcastle for service on the Canadian lakes, crossed the Atlantic and so made, perhaps, the longest sustained run. Loongana, at any rate, is the first ocean-going turbine steamer, and her owners, the Union Steamship Co.. can therefore claim the credit of being the pioneers of this remarkable development in ocean transit.

Messrs William Simons and Co., Ltd., a Renfrew shipbuilding firm, have just completed a very powerful' dredging vessel of their latest design, which I understand has been built for New Zealand owners. The dredger was launched complete, with steam up read for work, and as she left the ways she was named Murihiku by Walter Brown; of Monkdyke, Renfrew. Besides being fitted with a special set of buckets for dredging rocky ground, the vessel is fitted with a sand-suction' pump. The buckets as well as the suction pipe are made to dredge to a depth of 40ft. The hopper is arranged in such a manner that the dredgings can be relifted from the hopper and discharged over the side by a special patent arrangement of the builders, and delivered ashore through a long line of floating pipe for land reclamation or into barges moored at the fide of the dredger. Ordinary hinged doors fitted to the vessel's own hopper so that the material can be deposited at sea when required. The machinery consists of two sets of tripleexpansion engines' and two cylindricalboilers of 1601b working pressure. Alii the latest appliances, including waterheater, evaporator, filter ■ and electric-: light installation, are fitted on board. A paragraph in Weddel and Co.'s review of the frozen meat trade, for 1904,.; issued 'this weeki calls' attention' lo- the . I great carrying capacity of some of the i steamers now engaged in the, trade- For instance, the Banffshire, Buteshire. Fife- j shire. Morayshire. Nairnshire. and t?ur-. rev could each carry, at one loadjng, a much larger number of sheep than are" to be found in the various counties after which they are named. Ships of the size of the Highland Brigade (in the River: Plate trade) could carry in one, voyage all the sheep now grazing in Hertford and Middlesex, or in Clackmannan. Duhi-\ barton and Kincardine or the entire flocks of the Orkney Island?, the Isle of Man. ahd the Channel Islands together. Tli'e Nairoshire is now afloat with the, carcases of 7G.300 lambs and 15.000 sheep . on board, whiffs according to the official returns, the total number of sheep and lambs grazing hi the County of Nairn on