The Big Move

To begin with, having no good reason for not having posted in nearly a month and a half, I won't bore you with any. The biggest reason is inertia; finally having overcome that obstacle, let's get on with it. I had been planning to go in-depth on depth charges, but something else has come up to make depth charges No. 2 on my list.

No. 1 is the move. Monday it was decided was to be the day SLATER would be moved the mile down the Hudson to the other side of the river. Since the propulsion plant is completely non-functional, we made the move with the help of a pair of tugs. These two tugs move us on a purely volunteer basis, so we have to go whenever they have time. The big reason I mention this is that I had a mere 3.5 hours notice that the move was being made. Needless to say it took only 45 minutes for me to get out the door.

Upon arrival, there was a crane standing by to remove the gangway and a sizeable contingent of line handlers both ashore and aboard. But as soon as I stepped off the gangway onto the deck, I paused. Something was different. Something didn't feel right. It took me a mere second to realize what it was. But soon the alien vibration in my feet became clear as day: there was a diesel running somewhere! Rounding the No. 3 gun, I became aware of the blue smoke exhausting from the Emergency Diesel. By now, the rhythmic "thunk-a-click-a-thunk-a-click-a" was audible and only grew louder as I descended the ladder into B-4. At the foot of the ladder I was met by Carl, to whom I immediately exclaimed: "Hot damn, it sounds like an engine room now!" I don't know why the sound of that diesel made me grin as wide as it did, but after chinning for a couple of seconds, I went down the ladder to the lower level where I met Gus and made the same observation to him that I had made to Carl. Again, I don't know why seeing that diesel turning over, warming up to generate the electricity for the ship suring the move, seemed like such a beautiful sight to me, but it was. As much as I wanted to stay part of the Engineering Department for the move, Deck Division needed all the hands they could get, including mine.

After helping put canvas covers over the forward two 3" guns, the first tug arrived and began attaching itself to our starboard side forward. Once that was accomplished, we began to single up all the lines and the crane removed the gangway while the second tug busied itself attaching itself to the starboard side aft. Through the cold drizzle that fell throughout the process, one by one the singled lines were cast off and hauled aboard. Of course the hauling was my job, along with the other two volunteers who were assigned to the fo'c'sle with me. And then, ever so slowly, SLATER drifted away from the riverside and into the middle of the channel. It was a wierd feeling. The ship was dead for all intents and purposes, but the tugs lashed tightly to our side transferred their rumblings and vibrations into the hull of SLATER. It was almost like some sort of nautical artificial respiration. For the 20 minutes or so it took to make the move, SLATER felt like a ship and not a museum.

Now, here's where training took over. As we pulled lines aboard, one after another, the fo'c'sle began to look like a plate of spaghetti. I didn't notice this until after I had snapped several photos, but as soon as I did take notice, I thought "Oh, no. If 'Boats' sees this mess, he'll be pissed!" Some of the lines had been laid out down the port side, but the forward most lines has just been left where they lay. I immediately got to work, "faking down" the lines that were to go through the bull-nose. Halfway through this, I reflected on how silly that was. There were no Botswain's Mates aboard, and even if there were, they might have made a remark about the mess, but wouldn't have expected anyone to fix it. But, to hell with it, I couldn't let those civilians think that's how we do things in the Navy. I won't say that when I was done the fo'c'sle was inspection-ready, but it wasn't bad at all.

During my adventures in marlinspiking, the tugs, one at a time, had transferred themselves to our port side, because the ship would be moored on the starboard side. Slowly but surely, the tugs moved us into position, heaving lines were thrown across, and lines were singled up. Of course, this was not as easy as it seemed. We would put turns in the line around the bitts, and then word would come "Three feet forward", so we would either need to take in or slack the line three feet, depending on the orientation of the line. Back and forth, feet at a time, SLATER was moved into just the right position, the singled up lines were secured and then doubled up. Their jobs done, the tugs moved off, but not before engaging in some horeseplay that proved to be then antithesis of a tug-of-war.

Shore power was connected, the diesel secured, and the steel cables were passed ashore to add that extra bit of security to the mooring operation. All too soon, it was done. I can say that I have some sea time on a Navy ship, assuming that you apply liberal definitions to "sea" to include the Hudson River and "Navy ship" to include a 63-year-old DE incapable of moving under her own power. But I can say that I have more recent nautical experience than all of the students and a good 98% of the staff at work. That may seem like a minor point, but I'm proud of it.

I was on a schedule, so I had to get a ride back to the Albany side of the river before mooring was 100% complete. But once I got to my car, I took a second to snap a photo of where SLATER stood when I first saw her. But over the coming winter months, there will be plenty of heavy maintenance to be done, and I hope to be elbows-deep in it. Of course, I already know what my first project will be. I won't spoil it so as to keep intrest piqued, but let's just say that once I'm done with this, I may be eligible to cross-rate as a Gunner's Mate.

More School...

Well, since I'm still in the Albany area for another school for the Navy, you would think I would have time to get more done on the page here. But I decided that last week would be a good time to go back home on a week of leave, and so I did. Being a few hundred miles away kind of kept me away from the ship for a bit. But I figured I'd drop a line to let my loyal fans (all three of you) know that I didn't drop off the face of the planet.

Now, I'll apologize from the start that I really don't have much to add here. Hopefully that will change tomorrow, and if it does, I'll go for the unprecedented two-updates-in-a-single-weekend. But don't hold your breath.

This weekend was the 75th anniversary celebration for the Port of Albany, and the festival was held at our pier. There were plenty of folks on hand, and we had the ship open free of charge. But to deal with the masses (I've heard estimates of 1,000 to 1,800), we shortened the tour route and stationed guides along the way to give some brief points before the crowds moved along. So, other than two restroom breaks and a lunch break, I stood in forward bearthing and repeated the same five or six sentences for 6 hours, along with answering a question or two. I debated taking photos of all the folks who passed through, just to spice things up, but decided against it.

There are also two other important events that were commemorated today. Of course the Navy had yet another birthday, but on this day, 13 October, in 1944 a small portion of the US Navy won the most improbable victory probably in its entire history. A handfull of destroyers (DDs), destroyer escorts (DEs, like SLATER) and escort carriers (CVEs) faced off, toe to toe with the main Japanese battlefleet that was on its way to Leyte in the Philippine Islands to wipe out the American landings there and forced the Japanese to turn back. It's the best David-and-Goliath story I can think of since, well, David and Goliath.

I haven't the space or ability to do this subject justice in this small forum, so I apologize, but I'm going to make the closest thing I can to a demand. I very highly suggest to go to the library or the bookstore and get a copy of The Last Stand of the Tin Can Sailors by James D. Hornfischer. I'll make it easy for you. Click on the link at the bottom of the page and you'll go to the page to buy the book on Amazon.com. If you want to know what heroism is, you'll find it between the covers of this book. There were several places in the book that I had to stop and think about exactly what I had just read. And a few times, after I reflected on the heroism and sacrifice and plain horror that these men faced, I had to put the book down and dry my eyes. I can't say enough to do the book and the story behind it justice. Read the book. Read it, and you'll see what I mean. If this book won't make you proud to be an American, nothing will. When you're through with it, you'll know without a doubt exactly what a hero is.

http://www.amazon.com/Last-Stand-Tin-Sailors-Extraordinary/dp/0553802577

It's Not Easy Being Green

Of course that title makes no sense unless I were green. But according to common folklore, radiation makes you glow a faint greenish hue. And God know's I've been up to my neck in nuclear power these past weeks, getting ready for my final boards that will prove that I have learned enough to go to the next school. And I thought 5 1/2 years in college was bad...

So, to make up for my intransigence, I will begin with what I promised last time: 20mm guns. This photo from a page I found today, http://www.savetheptboatinc.com/ shows a single 20mm mount. The nine mounts (three forward, four midships and two aft) aboard SLATER are twin mounts. Designed by the Swiss during the closing days of World War I and firing explosive shells, the 20mm was a common AA mount whose effectiveness was diminished only by the increasing speeds of aircraft. With an effective range of ~2000 yards, the 20mm gunner would have only the eights or so it took a kamakazi to travel those 2000 yards before impact to destroy it. But the situation is not as dire as it sounds, for the 20mms were the last line of AA defense.

Previously one of the mounts has been really done over in style, and we are in the process of working on a second mount. The gun here has been removed from its mount for work. (Al Vanderzee gives one of his award-winning tours in the background.) Of course the plan is to get the gun looking good, not functioning. The steel plug welded in the barrels of the 2os before the ship was returned to us would make those efforts fruitless anyway.

The image to the right is details the top of the 20, where the magazine would sit. The magazines containted 60 rounds of ammuntion apiece, and would be passed belowdecks when empty to be refilled in a clipping room and then returned full to the gun for subsequent re-emptying.

To be honest, work had been weighing upon my mind quite a bit over the past few weeks, and it showed. My tours were not quite up to snuff on Thursday, and on Friday, I asked if there were any odd jobs to be done around; and of course there were. I was tasked first with notching some covers that were to be screwed to the top of the ammo lockers located on the centerline of the O-1 deck. The fabricators who made them put the notches in the wrong place, and to make them sit correctly, that problem had to be fixed. Of course I had no way to fill in the incorrect notches, so we had to settle for making more notches where they should have been.

And the tools of the trade: the hacksaw for making the cuts, the channel locks to wiggle the tab out, the file for removing the burrs and rough edges, and the coffe because, well, because I'm in the Navy.

The rest of the day, honestly, was spent doing a little piddling around, doing odd jobs, replacing a valve that I had cleaned previously, organizing things, and the like. I got a brush up on the ins and outs of CIC, took the covers off some radar sets and poked around, and then took care of the banging, scraping sound that had been annoying me most of the day.

The day had been windy, and the signal flags could have been starched for all I knew. One of the radio antennas on the port side had been rattled and twisted loose from the turnbuckle that held it in place just below the O-3 level (three floors up from the main deck). The antennas are fixed on the yardarm that crosses the mast, and on the side of the superstructure. The turnbuckle had to be reattached. Sounds easy? Well, no matter how we tried, when we leaned over the rail of the O-3 level, we were still a good two feet away from the turnbuckle. The wing on the O-2 level was a good 10 feet away. There was only one option: someone had to climb up two stories of superstructure. You'll never guess who did it. Those who do not like heights, you've been warned.

Just another day in the life of a SLATER volunteer. Wouldn't trade it for the world.

If it Moves, Salute it; if it Doesn't, Paint it.

That bit of wisdom has been in the Navy longer than anyone knows, which means it must be true. I found this past weekend that enginerooms do not move. As such, I spent a good amount of time painting B-4.

The immediate concern was the deckplates. I believe I have failed to mention previously that most of the deckplates on the upper and lower levels of B-4 (on the starboard side) had been painted previously. The entire division, all three of us, were concerned

with the gratings these two past weekends. On the port side of the upper level, rather than solid plates of steel for the deck, there are gratings, basically a catwalk, much like you would see above subway lines for ventilation. The lower level of the port side has solid deckplates. All of the decking, solid or grating, is not fastened down, but sits upon a framework of angle-iron. This allows for easy access to what would otherwise be generally inaccessable areas of the miles of piping that wind throughout the einginerooms.

The gratings had to be lifted out of place, taken up to the deck and then across to the picnic area ashore. After that, Gus and I ran an air line from the manifold in B-3, up to the second (O-1) deck, fastened it to a 20mm gun tub, and then ran it across to shore. Once the gratings were laid out, then the paint sprayer was unleashed on them, Gus and I taking turns changing the dull metal to shipshape gratings worthy of the finest of enginerooms. This was a multi-day project in and of itself.

This past weekend was more of the same. The upper level gratings had been returned to place during the week, and based on the "before" photo you saw, the difference is apparent. The upper level having been done, the same process had to be repeated for the deckplates in lower level.

But the process is a bit more involved than I first stated. Of course the deckplates have to be cleaned up, but to replace them on top of angle-iron that had not itself been chipped and painted would be, well, irresponsible. So most of Saturday found me with a scraper bar and rag going through 60 years worth of paint, oil, and grease. I kid you not, on some of the areas, I removed a 1/4" thick layer of dirt, oil, and grease and an additional 1/8 - 1/4" of paint. But in the end, everything looked fine, with the new paint applied. This Monday, while I'm taking a day off between work and USS SLATER, Gus and Carl will most likely be back at it, painting and then replacing the deckplates. Once that is done, B-4 will look 10 times better, but with still a ways to go.

Next, I think, will be B-3, the engineroom forward of B-4. Recently the welders cut a hole in the bulkhead separating B-4 and B-3, and a watertight door is scheduled to go in the hole. All original accesses to the enginerooms are through small hatches and steep ladders, so these doors will make the spaces more accessable for all our visitors.

Well, since I have been dink in posting, I suppose I have to drop a little teaser here. You see, they are doing some work on one of the 20mm mounts, and I did manage to get a few good photos. But, I'm just too darned tired to post and talk about them now, so I guess you'll just have to stick around and check back...

Fits and Starts

Well, folks, I admit it's been a while since I last posted, and there are a few reasons for that. One is that recently, I really haven't been doing anything other than messing around with the same valves on the mess deck, making them look much better and really taking my time for it. Second, or more of a continuation of first, is that I have been dedicating more of my time for tours recently. My work schedule has put me in Albany more during the week, and most of the maintenance crew comes in on Saturdays. So the maintenance I've been doing recently is light, one-man work; and there's really nothing that exciting about that.

However, I promise that after this coming weekend, there should be more interesting stories to relate and pictures to share. I'll be back down on a weekend, and there should be some more complex and detailed work to be done that will make for better reading and photography. Until then, I hope that you won't be too put off by my apparent leave of absence.

Enter the Trusty Sidekick

Well, it's finally happened. I've finally done it. I got another student in my section down to SLATER, and I think he's hooked. And truth be told, it was really his idea. Most people at work know what I do over my weekends, and often times I get asked about it. "Are you going down to Albany this weekend?" and other variants of that question are not uncommonly asked of me. So when an Electrician's Mate asked me if he could come along the other day, I of course immediately checked with "the Management" and told him to come along.

Due to the work schedule and corresponding screwyness of our sleep schedules, we didn't get down to Albany until about noon. The sun was too hot in my opinion to stay outside painting, and the valves in B-4 and other spaces belowdecks lacked air conditioning, so I made my way down to the mess deck instead and decided that some of the valves down there could use some work. Little did I know what I was getting myself in for.

I removed three valves. The first valve had what looked like solder or a weld bead across the stem, which made removing the handwheel on impossible. In fact, there wasn't even a nut, just these dribbles of once-molten metal fouling the threads and keeping the handwheel in place. Since the handwheel was non-period aluminum, I decided that some "machanical agitation" would not be uncalled for. So I went and retrived a "mechanical agitator" (tr. "large hammer") and proceeded to, er, "remove" the handwheel, with charm, grace, and refinement.

That having been done, I cut the threaded portion away, ground down the top, drilled and tapped the stem for a screw after having taken the various parts to the wire wheel and cleaning them up. Reassembled, the valve went back into place. And that, truth be told, is about all I got done in six hours. The rest of it, fighting with valves that didn't want to come out, didn't want to come apart, and didn't want to co-operate, is pretty much standard operating procedure, and you've heard about it all before. On one of the valves, I even encountered a handwheel nut that was truly welded into place. The handwheel is unique, so I'm going to have to finesse this one over the next few weeks.

In the middle of all of this, the "Electrician for Hire", or EM3, as I'll call him here, was busy delving into the electrical side of things. I showed him the enginerooms and the power distribution switchboards, and then he was introduced to some of the electrical bits aboard, and he spent most of the day, after having initially helped me remove the valves, reading up on and disassembling a set of synchros. Hopefully his intrest has been piqued to the point that he'll be a regular until our class leaves school here.

Well, that's about all I've got for today. The plan is to get B-4 on the tour by next month. Two months ago, I didn't think it'd be possible. But day by day, the pieces come together, and I'm tempted to say that we just might make it.

I'm Going to Have to Refer You to a Specialist...

Well, it's been a quiet week aboard the USS SLATER, my weekend retreat. (For those of you who can place that opening, good for you!) The end of the week had been crummy weather-wise, but I was pleased to see clear skies when I awoke at 7 Saturday morning (which is late for me), and despite mild backups on I-87 due to construction, the drive to Albany was as pleasant as ever. Or it would have been were it not for the problem that I knew would still be confronting me when I arrived: the broken pipe end in the reducer.

Arriving as usual, I made my change from mild-mannered, street-roaming civilian to The Mechanic For Hire, stepping into the Engineer's Office in civvies and re-emerging moments later, blue coveralls spotless, black boots gleaming, third class crow pin in NAVY ballcap shining, ready to take on 60 years of rust, crud, corrosion, and paint!

First up, my arch enemy from last week, the reducer. There were no larger extractors to be found. The largest one I could find was just barely too narrow to be wedged inside the pipe like I needed it to be. I tried bending washers and wedging them in, making the hole smaller. The extractor slipped. I tried wrapping it in thin sheet copper. The extractor slipped. In desparation, I put a wood shim in. The extractor slipped. I had no choice. I was licked. I had to call in the experts.

The experts, wisened beyond their years, came and looked at my problem. I described the efforts I had made, and they nodded gravely. I detailed the ways in which I had tried to gently finesse the broken end of pipe out of the reducer. They scratched their chins and frowned. I offered suggestions of alternatives for consideration. They reached for a hammer and chisel. But by bit, the experts tapped, tinkered, and finally, they showed me what they were up to. How they were gently chiseling the pipe in on itself to make removal possible. Then they handed the chisel and hammer to me, at which time I tried to replicate their detailed work. And I failed. The small piece of pipe that had me licked for the better part of two weeks came out, but the threads in the brass reducer were so marred and mauled that I thought at first that the reducer was a total loss. But, in the spirit of giving it the old college try, I pulled out a tap and did what I could to make the threads serviceable again; I must say that I was pleased with the result.

With the reducer finally back in one piece, it was time to find a way to replace or fabricate the piece of piping and union that I had broken previously. I decided that the easiest way to go for several reasons (not the least of which being that I had left the broken-off piece to be replicated at home) was to install a new piece of pipe, remove the old union and put a new one in. Digging throught the plumbing storage area that is after steering (not to mention unventilated and extremely hot), I found the union I needed and returned to the machine shop to make the changes.

First, to remove the unbroken half of the union. I decided the way to go would be to remove the smaller piece from the overhead in the engineroom and take it up to the machine shop and work on it with the vice. However, when I put the wrench on and turned, it was not the coupling I was expecting that loosened, but one about three feet away. Try as I might, with only those two wrenches, either the whole three feet of pipe was coming out, or nothing at all. Five minutes later, I returned to the Machine Shop with three feet of pipe...

Five minutes with the vice, and the piping section came apart: about 8" of pipe with the union, a moisture separator, another 10" of pipe, and a valve. I put the part with the union in the vice, turned, and no dice. I got a larger wrench. No dice. Enter Erik Collin, who, without a word entered, picked up a blowtorch, heated the union, and then handed me the wrench. The union came right off. It's one of those principles that seems to get pushed to the back of your mind when learning about nuclear power: metal expands when heated. The Experts: 2; Mechanic For Hire: 0. So all the bits and parts got disassembled, the globe valve reconditioned and its stem tapped for a new handwheel, and reinstalled. It is at this point I will pause, because it was about this time I was interrupted by someone calling my name from down in the engineroom.


Gus, the Expert on the right in the first photo, had been rearranging some boxes in the engineroom (which I will call by it's designator of B-4, since if you're still reading this, you're initated enough to know what it's really called). He came across two plastic cases that he thought I should look in. I of course opened the two boxes, each one about the size of a sandwich, and in each one were about half a dozen extractors, all large enough to have been useful earlier when trying to take that piece of pipe out of the reducer! Talk about a useful discovery that would have been better found 3 hours prior!

So, after that bit of news, I was ready to put the reducer back in and be done with it. So bit by bit, piece by piece, the jigsaw puzzle I had removed over the past few days of work was reassembled. Once it was done, I can't say that it looked bad.


Okay, well that's about all I've got for you now. There is more, of course, but I'm going to save it. There's no guarantee that I'll have time over my next days off to return to Albany, and in that eventuality, I want to have some material left over for next weekend. Unless something else comes to mind, I'm thinking a brief lesson on electrical theory? Don't worry, I won't make you do homework; but, just like when I give a tour, no one is safe from a pop-quiz...