THE LIBERTY SHIPS
By F.J.W and D. Innola
Sources: Liberty Ships and Associated Designs By Sam Peters, The Liberty Ships by L.A. Sawyer and W.H. Mitchell, The National American Archives.
Part Two.
The point that the Liberty ship was a British design is not questionable, however the end product bore only a slight resemblance to Empire Liberty. The Americans made alterations to the original concept such as allowing for the welding of the whole ship and doing away with furnaced plates incorporating a slight curve to the ship during its construction, this left just two plates that required power pressing, these were positioned either side of the forefoot. Some of the cost cutting and speeding up of the process did unfortunately result in subsequent hull fractures, this, at the time was blamed on heavy deck cargo’s creating unusual stress patterns, not the case but some time was to pass before the quality of the welding was questioned! Some time later and only after ships broke in half whilst on passage strengthening plates were welded in the regions most prone to fracturing. During 1942/43 large losses of life occurred during such events and most happened in Arctic waters, statistics dictated that 12.5 % of all Liberty’s had weld defects, 10 % had developed serious structural faults and one in thirty had major faults. An alarming event occurred in Alaska when a Liberty which had been converted for use as a troop ship broke in half when alongside whilst loaded with troops, this single event delayed the conversion of a further ten ships until remedial action could be successfully carried out. Another misfortune due to mass production and insufficient investigation was the propensity for propellers to just fall off, later this was discovered to be caused by corrosion brought about by not fitting gland-sealing rings, again the fault was rectified.
Not all parts of the ships were welded and considerable latitude was given to the builders, some yards riveted frames and seams, others the deckhouses and later all yards riveted the gunwales and deck straps. Other of the major alterations were to fit a contra rudder which not only improved the ships speed but aided its manoeuvrability, they also centralised the accommodation, this not only saved a considerable amount of time but also saved on piping and cable. Minor alterations included steel decks in place of wood sheathed ones, bulwarks replaced chain rails, and steel plates replaced the bridge canvas wind dodgers, access wells to the holds, an aft steering facility and searchlights. Unfortunately as with most things the powers that be could not leave well alone and before too long cost cutting alterations became the norm. It seems ludicrous now but they were not fitted with fire detection equipment of any kind, no emergency generator, no gyrocompass, no radio direction finder and no radio’s fitted within the lifeboats, in fact these were only a selection of the three dozen or so changes made to the final product. A shortage of steel prompted the shortening of anchor chains to such an extent that the two original anchors fitted were reduced to one.
Two new shipyards were authorised in January 1941 for the production of Liberty Ships, they were the Oregon Shipbuilding Corporation based at Portland that eventually had eleven slipways and the Bethlehem-Fairfield Shipyard Inc, based at Baltimore that had sixteen slipways. Another nine emergency yards were approved in 1941, at Baltimore, Wilmington, New Orleans, Mobile, Houston, Los Angeles, Portland, plus the two building the sixty ‘Oceans’ at Todd Shipyards/Bath Ironworks/Henry J Kaiser group.
President Roosevelt had declared in a speech earlier that America would build a bridge of ships across the Atlantic, he later not only emphasised the fact but also declared in a speech aimed at the shipyard workers that he wanted more and still more ships. He also set out America’s plans on arming their ships ‘Each new ship’ he said, ‘strikes a blow at the menace to the nation and for the liberty of the free people of the world…..we propose that these ships shall sail the seas as intended, and to the best of our ability shall protect them from torpedoes, bombs or shells’. Duly on the 13th of November 1941 the Neutrality Law was finally amended and from that moment on America started to arm its merchant ships. As events turned out it wasn’t a moment to soon as Japans attack on the 7th of December prompted both Hitler and Mussolini to declare war on America on the 11th four days later.
President Roosevelt, appointed an unknown in the shipping industry to front the liberty ship programme, he was Henry J. Kaiser a one time photographic shop owner from New York who had eventually become the head of one of America’s largest construction company’s. His earlier feats of note had been the building of the Dams Grand Coulee, Hoover and Bonneville, and the building of the San Francisco Bridge, he brought to the programme initiative, drive and ability in equal measure and was always prepared to take on the impossible.
It was Kaiser’s yards that started work on Britain’s ‘Oceans’ and it was the same man that constructed new yards with the assistance of experts from his dam building projects. His workforce in the main had never seen a shipyard and one worker in three was a woman, one worker in four had never seen the sea but it wouldn’t be long before they would be building ships faster than the world had ever seen. Kaiser’s idea was to approach the problem from the Henry Ford example of mass production and assembly lines. From the ships drawings that were finally agreed upon wooden templates were cut and distributed to all the yards participating and from those wooden templates the steel was cut to build the ships. The yards were merely assembly plants drawing their sources from far and wide across America; some thirty-two States were involved in the production of parts en masse. Some of the production yards had no slipways whatsoever, the ships were built in basins and docks then on completion the said areas were flooded and the ships floated out.
YARD PLAN.
He also introduced the idea of why drill a hole for rivets when you can weld, why weld when you can bend and why bend when you can leave it straight. The shipyards looked like massive assembly kits spread out over many acres of land, each ship consisted of a quarter of a million different parts, there was 43 miles of welding, 5 miles of wiring and 7 miles of piping, the whole thing when constructed was the equivalent of a forty story building……. on its side! Due to increasing frustrations caused by late deliveries of steel Kaiser also sought and found his own supply of iron ore in Utah and built California’s first steel mill.
JOHNS RIVER BEFORE YARD CONSTRUTION.
JACKSONVILLE, FLORIDA. Est: 1942.
JOHNS RIVER AT HEIGHT OF SHIPBUILDING PROGRAMME
At all times during their production the ships underwent various modifications and in some cases total design changes took place, for instance tankers and colliers were a by-product of the original design. Many were converted for use as troopships, hospital ships, depot and repair, the latter type of ship even had extra accommodation fitted to cater for the crews of ships awaiting their vessels repair. The modified ships bore little resemblance to the original product and the only clue as to its beginnings was the hull form.
SAMLEYTE UNDER COSTRUCTION AT J.A. JONES CONSTRUCTION COMPANY, BRUNSWICK YARD,BRUNSWICK, GEORGIA.
ENGINE: FILER & STOWELL COMPANY, MILWAUKEE, WISCONSIN.
The vast majority of Liberty ships built were of the standard design and were designated EC2-S-C1, E = Emergency, C2 = Cargo between 400ft to 450ft, S = Steam and C1 indicated the particular design of the ship type. They were of the full scantling type with a raked stem and cruiser stern, they were single screwed and equipped with a contra balanced rudder. Each ship had two full decks the full length of the vessel with seven watertight bulkheads that all rose to the upper deck, this allowed for five cargo holds. The first watertight bulkhead separated the forward stores and forepeak from No 1 Hold. Bulkheads 2 & 3 divided No 1 and 2 Holds whilst No 4 bulkhead was forward of the engine room with No 5 at the aft end, No 6 separated 4 & 5 holds and No 7 was aft of No 5 hold and forward of the after peak.
PLAN OF STANDARD TYPE LIBERTY
The propulsion plant was located in a single compartment directly beneath the accommodation; access to the shaft tunnel was by way of the ships only watertight door situated in No 5 w/t bulkhead, it would be possible to gain entry to the steering gear using this route. The hull was transversely framed and in most cases welded, the stem above the load line was fabricated out of heavy formed plate and the stern contained three sections of cast steel. The bilge keels were ten inches deep and travelled from midway No 2 hold to the after end of the machinery space, an aft bilge well was situated beneath the stern gland. The rudderpost top was made of forged steel with the head carrier taking the whole weight of the rudder, its neck bearing was made of cast steel and travelled in a lignum vitae lining. Number two hold had the largest capacity, followed by number three, then four and five with number one having the least space available. Fuel oil was carried in the wing tanks by way of the boiler room with further bunkers stored in twelve inner double bottoms, reserve boiler feed water could be stored beneath the main engine and boilers. The two forward deep tanks could either be used for dry cargo or seawater ballast, number three deep tank situated aft of the engine room could be used for dry cargo, cargo oil or ships bunkers.
SAMALNESS UNDER CONSTRUCTION AT J.A. JONES CONSTRUCTION COMPANY, BRUNSWICK YARD, BRUNSWICK, GEORGIA.
ENGINE: FILER & STOWELL COMPAMY, MILWAUKEE, WISCONSIN.
Wood and plywood was used to divide the various staterooms, cabins, messrooms, offices and alleyways. The accommodation was housed in a three deck prefabricated structure located midships with a further single deck unit situated aft. The Captain and Radio Officer were situated starboard side and port side respectively of the bridge deck. Deck and Engineer Officers were housed on either side of the boat deck with the crew at four to a cabin were situated on the upper deck. The Officers lounge and saloon was at the forward end of the deckhouse on the upper deck whilst the PO’s and crew’s messroom was on the port side of the deckhouse, all the afore mentioned had steam heating. The galley which was coal fired was midships between the engine and boiler casings as were the chilled and dry storerooms, the hospital was in the aft accommodation block as were the medical storerooms and some cabins for DEMS gunners.
The ships crew numbers varied but it was originally intended that they should carry a compliment of forty-five but this was later increased to eighty-one which, included gun crew totalling thirty six men. Later the ships crew was raised to fifty-two and the gun crew reduced to twenty-nine.
The ships had three steel masts and each had a mast house, the forward mast was designed to be able to operate to a safe working load of thirty tons, the midships mast worked to ten tons and the after mast capable of 15 tons. With the ships expected to operate in foreign ports the British design of boom arrangements was adopted and ten steam winches provided the motive force required to carry out the cargo work. In addition to the cargo winches the ships were fitted with both a windlass and warping winch.
SAMFAIRY UNDER CONSTRUCTION AT J.A. JONES CONSRUCTION COMPANY, BRUNSWICK YARD, BRUNSWICK, GEORGIA.
ENGINE: GENERAL MACHINERY CORPORATION HAMILTON, OHIO
The ships navigating equipment comprised magnetic compasses and binnacles situated in the wheelhouse, on the monkey island and also in the steering gear compartment. Other basic equipment included a searchlight an echo sounder, foghorns, voice tubes, clocks. bells, mechanical bridge/engine room telegraphs and alarm gongs. Though no fire detection equipment was provided an alarm system was in place, which was operated from the bridge utilising the interior communication circuit. The Sea Water hydrant system could provide both barrier cooling and fire fighting capability using hydrants fitted throughout the ship at regular intervals, steam smothering was fitted in all the holds. Portable fire extinguishers were strategically placed throughout the accommodation and the machinery spaces had CO2 smothering systems. Four steel lifeboats were provided of which one was powered, later a second powered replaced one of the oared variety, all were equipped with sails and basic survival necessities, unfortunately the radio was deemed as an excessive luxury.
Engine & Auxiliaries
The reasons for choosing the triple expansion engine as opposed to the much faster turbine has already been covered, nevertheless the Americans did suffer a shortage of qualified crew to man their engine rooms, not so the British who’s own merchant ships were predominantly powered by the triple expansion. The engine was a three cylinder direct acting type which produced 2,500 horsepower at 76 rpm providing a projected speed of eleven knots, this rpm was really unattainable due to excessive vibration and revs had to be reduced to 66 rpm thus reducing the horsepower and speed accordingly.
TRIPLE EXPANSION ENGINE.
Steam was provided by two, cross sectional sinuous header straight tube type and fitted with superheaters, working pressure was 220 lbs per square inch at 450° F with a combined heating surface of 10,234 sq ft. The power plant consisted of three steam reciprocating generators at 400 rpm providing DC electricity each capable of 25kw at 120 volts, 167 amps, the circulating pumps were also steam reciprocating. The daily fuel consumption was in the region of 30 tons a day giving the Liberty’s a maximum range of sixty days steaming.
ARMAMENT
GUN CREW
Using the John W Brown launched on the 27th of September 1942 at the Bethlehem Fairfield yard in Baltimore Maryland each of this type were fitted with 3 x 3 inch fifty calibre guns, I x 5 inch fifty one calibre gun and eight 20 mm anti aircraft guns.
Go to Part Three