GAS ENGINES AT SEA.

Dominion, Volume 3, Issue 905, 26 August 1910, Page 5

GAS ENGINES AT SEA.

GERMAN LINER TO BE FITTED. By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright ', Berlin, August 24. The Hamburg-American Line has ordered from Blohni and Yoss, shipbuilders, Hamburg} a•. 9000-ton Atlantic liner fitted with internal combustion engines of' tlio Diesel typo.

The gunboat Rattler was fitted some short time back by Messrs. . Deardmorc with a'suction producer and gas engine, and tho installation in the gunboat has attained a fair measure of succcs"s. Lord' Graham, the Commander of tho Clyde Division of'.tho Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve, which has used the Rattler as a training ship, contends that "the performances of tho vessel have demonstrated the practicability of marine propulsion by gas, and that the results jus-, tify economical, strategical, and fighting prospects of great advantage to the Navy."

The Admiralty have also fitted up engines with gas producers on shore, and have been experimenting in the samo direction, while the Vickors firm havo found the svstern so satisfactory that Mr. M'Keclurie, one of their directors, proposed some three years ago to fit a battleship with the new method of propulsion. The principal difficulty appears to have been concerned with the substance from which the gas was produced, anthracite coal giving tho best results. , More recently it has been reported that trouble and expense may bo saved by the uso of refuse oil, ami as oil may bo. used also as an alternative to gas. in the engine, a solution of the diflVuUy may be found in. this way. In any case," the circumstance that naval stokers are to bo trained in the use of tho mechanism for suction gas propulsion seems to point to a new development of great interest. ,