For JD

I know how you enjoy big diesels and they don't get much bigger than this.

http://www.shipsnostalgia.com/guides/William_Doxford_and_Sons

An interesting read and look at machining fifty or so years ago. Here's a link to information on the Emma Maersk and the Wartsila-Sulzer engine in that ship. Huge! 109,000 horsepower and 5, 608,000 ft/lb torque. (real horses!) 1660 gallons of fuel/hour. Takes a lot to feed those horses.

http://gcaptain.com/maritime/blog/emma-maersk-engine/

more info on the engine: http://people.bath.ac.uk/ccsshb/12cyl/

Great stuff guys. I've never seen that first one before and saved it near the new one.

One of the most striking things about that place is the cleanliness of the shop and all the equipment. It makes Southside Machine Shop in St. Louis look like an total shit hole. They do some of the biggest stuff in the country but in about the messiest place in the country too. It has wood block floors like a lot of old machine shops do but the whole place is saturated with cutting oil and just dirt in general. There are areas where they put down carpet remnants to keep from walking in oil, they got saturated, and they threw another piece on top of that. All this in metal buildings. If the place ever caught on fire there would be nothing to do but stand back and let it burn. After a couple of trips there I found a way to the shop foreman's office without going through those filthy shops. His office floor is a little dryer than out in the shop but otherwise it's about the same in there.

I was in a machine and fabrication shop that did work for the nuclear industry..........nearly as clean as my house. The majority of their work was stainless, with a lesser amount of aluminum and almost no steel. HaD some fabulous and state of the art machinery in their shop.

JD, I wonder how deep the cutting oil and cooling fluid goes down under Southside Machine?

I'd guess it's about 1 or 2 feet thick of totally dead soil under that one shop I've been through, it's a very old establishment. It'll be OK as long as the shop is standing. The oil will stay put as long as it is sheltered and not moved by rain or extreme temperatures.

Ya oughta see the machine shop I use for my engine work. Been taking stuff to this fellow for the last 30 years. Must be about 80 by now. Just him and his son. Old school guy no fancy BS stuff but knows what hes doing and doesn't bend you over the table in the process. Building is an old trolley barn that sits between two old brick buildings. Half of it has old crankshafts that came from God knows where hanging from the ceiling. Other half is the work end. No insulation and the only heat is an old coal stove that they throw in what ever happens to be handy. I should take a picture or two. It's like walking into a dungeon. Want to know how much oil concrete can absorb then this is your test station. City wants him out real bad but he told them to piss up a rope.

Might add that the thing that intriged me most about the boat shop wasn't the parts they were making so much as the machines they were using. Never seen lathes that big before and there were rows and rows of them and the milling machines. Just way to cool.