A NOVEL STEAMER.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXV, Issue 3, 5 January 1915, Page 7

A NOVEL STEAMER.

ARRIVAL AT SYDNEY, (Received 10.30 a.m.) Sydney, January The Annam, the pioneer of a Danish line- of steamers seeking to secure some trade previously held by the Germans, has arrived. She is of novel construction, being fitted with an adaptation of Diesel motor engines, and is without funnels. An Australian paper states:—lnterest attaches to the advent of the Annam in Australian waters, inasmuch as she has no funnels. r J he vessel is motor driven, being fitted with Diesel engines, and : s the pioneer liner of the' East Asiatic Company, Ltd. (Aktieselskabet Det Ostasiatiske Kompagni) of Copenhagen, a large and powerful Danish shipping and trading company. This company recently decided to extend its operations to Australia, and has inaugi ted a monthly service from Scandinavian, English, and Mediterranean ports. The principal loading ports will probably be Copenhagen, Gothenburg, Fredrickstad, and British and Italian ports. Ports of discharge will he Fremantle, Adelaide, Melbourne, and Sydney. The company has a fleet of 39 vessels, and 12 of these are equipped with the Diesel engines, and are without funnels. The exhaust gases are carried up one of the masts to an outlet a considerable height above the deck. Further advantages of this type of engine are economy in working expenses due to tho relatively smaller consumption of oil fuel as com. pared with the coal consumption or steam vessels, compactness of the machinery, speed in starting and reversing the engines, which can be set in motion in five minutes, as against 12 hours required for raising steam in ordinary vessels using coal. These engines can be reversed in 30 seconds.

j The Siam, a sister ship of the Annara, covered a distance of 35,000 I miles with a consumptoin of 1446 tons | of oil fuel, including the amount necessary for loading and discharging the various cargoes en route. A steam- | ship of similar size would have required about 7500 tons of coal for j such a voyage. The Annam is of the following di. mensions; Length between perpendiculars, 410 ft; breadth moulded. ■ssft; depth, moulded, 30ft Gin and 38ft Gin; engines, two motors, developing 3300 indicated horse power. The cargo capacity is 490,600 cubic feet, dead weight 9400 tons, capacity of oil tanks 1254 tons. She fas water-ballast for 1445 tons. There are five hatches, and the vessel has four masts. The gross register is 5295 tons, and the net 3325 tons. Her Kneed (loaded) is 12 knots. She we." built by Burmeister and Wain, Copenhagen, last year, and is classed 100 A 1 at Llovd’s.