Remarkable Vessels.

Thames Star, Volume XIII, Issue 4310, 24 October 1882, Page 2

Remarkable Vessels.

There are now building in the United States two - snips which, for speed and general excellence of locomotion, will far transcend any-'vessel' at present afloat. One of these—the dome steamer Meteor —is in course of construction- at Nyack, on the Httdson. She is the invention of Mr A. B. Bliven, of Brooklyn, and is being built under his personal supervision. The engines are capable -of making 350 reyoluiJQßS per minute, which gives a velocity 't6;tKt wheel of over 45 miles per hour, so thaHJH|> expected that the Meteor will be able to make fully 25 miles per hour, and thus .complete the distance from New York to Qaeenstown or Bristol in a little over five days. (The vessel is being built entirely from American materials by American mechanics, and is intended as the pioneer of a class of large steel steamers which will follow in rapid sue cession. A new feature of the engines is that the high*pressure cylinders are enclosed within the low-pressure cylinders, only two cylinders being risible; and this

method will prevent condensation in the

cylinder, thus saving all the power of the steam. The vessel will be supplied "with £ steam generator of the water-tube pattern, which is practically four boilers in one, having two smoke stacks each

3 feet in diameter and 20 feet high, four steam safety valves, and four fire grates. The boilers when set up are oval in shape. The Meteor will be 156 feet in length overall; length at waterline, 132 feet 6 inches ; length on keel. 125 feet 6 inches; depth of hold, 16 feet 6 inches; draft of water aft, 11-feet; tonnage, carpenter's measurement, 512 33-100. She is the

strongest' vessel 6f her size ever,built, being constructed of white oak, locust, hackmatnc, ash, and hard pine. Besides

her dome deck she will have a main or spar deck, eight feet below her dome deck, as strong as it is possible to make it. Nothing will be seen above her deck except the pilot-house and smoke stacks. Last, but not least, no one need be ex-

posed on a steamer of this type, for in stormy, rough weather she can be closed up ■ perfectly watertight, and driven through and over tbe heaviest seas without any danger to passengers, crew, hulk* * or machinery. A charter has been granted to the New England Quick-transit Steamship Company of Boston, capital 5,000,000 dollars, and they will shortly commence building sleel steamers of the above type of 7000 tons capacity to run between Boston and British and European, ports. St. Louis and Chicago capitalists are likewise forming a company, to be called the South Atlantic Quick-transit Line, whioh

will ran from Southern American, ports^ to European ports'; while a third company, known as the National Construction Company of New York, tare purchased . a large water frontage and twenty-seven acres of land, adjoining the Manhattan Eailroad Docks at Bay Ridge, for the ; purpose of shipbuilding on a large icale, and after the Meteor type. Tbe second singular vessel in course of construction is the Oceanic, now being built at Hastings, on the Hudson. The principle of this steamship is the invent< tion of Mr Robert Fryer, of New York. It is stated to be a kind of marine velocipede on three wheels, tbe hull not being intended to touch the water. The most* curious point of the invention is that the . support of the ship, the float as it were,' and the propellers are one and the same; The vessel floats on three spheres, made of sheet steel, one forward and two stern;

each of these is fitted with flanges which surround nearly the whole of its circumference and actas paddles. The- spheres are so arranged that they can be worked backward and forward, or one worked backward, and the others forward simsd* taneously, so that the vessel may be turned completely round in her own water, and.

with such a rapid power of turning no rudder will be necessary. The whole vessel is / made watertight, so that in the event of the wheels or spheres being broken.pr disabled, or the vessel capsized, it will i still possess sufficient buoyancy to prevent it from sinking. The spheres are; provided with a flanged keel, to adapt the vessel for usejpn rails, in case of crossiog r , an isthmus or, for being run upon latftt for repairs. The is designed only for passenger traffic, and it is asserted ,

that its peculiar construction gives increased accommodation, greater safety, and a higher rate of speed than that now 1 * attained. .The Oceanic will be 224 feet. long and 180 feet wide, the spherical wheels being 24 feet in diameter, and < •drawinfe« i<fl*e' le& *whea "itiii&jiLyJShe trial «rf ■ small model OTtfce st«amer excited sreat interest re* cently on the Harlem diver, and it travelled equally well ba land. The inventor claims that as much difference exists between it and aa Ordinary boat as between a waggon mounted on wheels and one that should rest on the ground and be dragged along- .the surface by means ,of wheels attached to its sides. The Nautii cal Gazette observes that, if sucoessful, I the invention must revolutionise passen- r ger traffic by water, as the vessel for a given amount of this traffic could be built for what the ordinary vessel wonld ooit, and would perform double service. These remarkable developments of shipbuilding ' certainly promite to make even our swift* tjoing steamers a thing of the past, as the latter have'done by the clumsy vessels of half a century ago.