American Victory

[navarch]

Thanks Jerry, the idea I was going with is why hasn't just replacing the main boilers on steamers ever been considered instead of a total repowering? The majority of household electricity across the nation is generated by steam turbines, so that demonstrates the efficiency of turbines. It's understood that cost to operate is the issue, but it really is about using outdated boilers. Again, just a thought.

Like GuestfromEU said, steam turbines are really only efficient at high speeds/loads, and are also a viable option when very high levels of power are needed. That's why you see power plants and Navy ships using them. For other vessels, diesel technology has advanced (compared to when Great Lakes ships were built) to be much more efficient than steam turbines a very broad range of speeds. This is especially important for Great Lakes vessels as their engine loads vary so much. Replacing boilers would increase the efficiency of the steam turbine, but not nearly as much as replacing the entire powerplant with diesel engines. It is not just a matter of replacing boilers.

[Shipwatcher1]

I too have been curious about that. Then again, I would almost suspect that the installation of new boilers has the potential to be almost as involved, and expensive as a diesel conversion. Consider that along with the boilers, most likely all associated plumbing would be upgraded, new control systems installed, etc.

[Guest]

Guest, when the steam engine or turbine is removed for diesel conversion, the main boilers are removed also. The electricity is generated with new diesel generators. The ship will have a small capacity to produce steam using exhaust gas boilers but that steam supply is limited.

Thanks Jerry, the idea I was going with is why hasn't just replacing the main boilers on steamers ever been considered instead of a total repowering? The majority of household electricity across the nation is generated by steam turbines, so that demonstrates the efficiency of turbines. It's understood that cost to operate is the issue, but it really is about using outdated boilers. Again, just a thought.

[GuestfromEU]

You're absolutely correct in the efficiency of steam turbines and turbogenerators. Unfortunately, they are only efficient at or near full load (same with boilers/steam generators). Even at full sea speed, a ship's main propulsion turbine and boilers are not running 100%.

Few companies are left which make steam generators suitable for shipboard propulsion. Kawasaki does, possibly Mitsubishi, and someone in Korea or China. They are not off-the-shelf items. The only ships built today which are using steam propulsion are Ultra Large Gas Carriers (LNG), and this is only certain designs which do not have reliquifaction plants. Most new LNG carriers have the reliquifaction plants. This allows them to turn the boil-off gas into liquid again (and put back into the cargo tanks). Some ships are designed to allow the gas to boil off, which is then recovered and sent to the steam generators. Very specialized, and very rare.

The engineering studies and fabrication of two D-type steam generators to fit the need of the Valor or Victory would easily exceed the cost of replacing with diesel engines. The cost of ABS approval on the boilers alone would likely exceed the cost of simply replacing with diesel engines. Foster Wheeler, Combustion Engineering, and Babcock & Wilcox are no longer options, either being out of business or out of the marine industry in general.

[Guest]

The need for additional hulls, return on investment and economic conditions, I would think, play a serious role with the decision makers.

[Bob]

Seems ashame that the American victory and possibly the American valor are going to scrap, I realize the cost of replacing the engines is enormous but these two ships haven't ran in the last ten years and the hulls are in great shape so even if they did replace the engines you would think they could run the ship long enough to recoop the cost of the conversion and then some. Just my thoughts!

[Jerry at Duluth]

Guest, when the steam engine or turbine is removed for diesel conversion, the main boilers are removed also. The electricity is generated with new diesel generators. The ship will have a small capacity to produce steam using exhaust gas boilers but that steam supply is limited.

[Guest]

The talk of replacing the steam propulsion, there has never been any mention or discussion of just replacing the main boilers on the steamers that get diesel engines. Steam turbines are efficient, i.e. the reason the majority of electricity is produced by them. The cost of producing steam with outdated boilers is the issue. Just a thought.

[GuestfromEU]

Salt cargo has no effect on ship's engines. Salt water has a greater effect, but not directly on the engines. Sea water piping for cooling, and fresh water/salt water heat exchangers take the abuse. I am not sure if the Algolake - and any 1970s era lakers - have separate sea water/fresh water cooling systems.

The bigger reason is the Pielstick engines are old, worn out, not efficient, and not to current emission standards. I believe any major reconstruction (i.e. grafting hull of one ship to machinery space of another) would mandate current emission standards. It's like taking a well used 20 year old Ford F-150 and replacing the box with one from a 10 year old Dodge Ram. At the end of the day, it will not be cheap, it won't really work right, and you are still left with old parts.

As for the Middletown/American Victory, the amount of work required to replace her steam plant would be atrocious. She is still fitted with steam mooring winches, steam heating, etc. If using the argument that Interlake converted the Lee A Tregurtha, yes, they did. Though, she is larger capacity, and the cost of conversion proved beneficial due to tax credits, and cost comparison of building a new hull. Canada has the advantage of being able to build overseas, greatly reducing construction costs (at the demise of a national shipbuilding industry, but that's another topic). The USA complies with the Jones Act, which has the unfortunate side effect of escalating newbuild construction costs to prohibitory levels.

The days of Upper Lakes Shipping and Frankenstein conversions are long gone.

[Guest]

I believe that Algoma has already announced its intention of scrapping the American Victory, so that pretty much ends any speculation of its future.

As for the second Poe class lock at Sault Ste. Marie, this debate has been going on since at least the early 1980s, and yet here we are nearly 40 years later with no real progress.

[Guest]

Easily the biggest expense when repowering a steamer isn't the diesel, it's the shipyard time to do all of the work.

They could never justify it all when it's a 40+ year old diesel engine that is nearing the end of its life, isn't as fuel efficient or environmentally friendly, and perhaps has questionable parts availability today that makes repairs and overhauls take longer and cost more than they should.

Back around 2006 when BNSF was still acquiring DC motored ES44DC's for manifests and such that didn't need the benefits of AC motored power (Which for a six motor unit at the time, was adding 500k+ to the price tag), I remember seeing a breakdown of prices. Each ES44DC was running about 1.4 million a pop, and of that the price of the 4,500 hp GEVO-12 diesel engine was estimated to account for about half a million.

Yet I believe Interlake's CEO a while back put the price tag of their five repowers at 100 million dollars. Granted, the cost obviously wasn't the same to repower the Herbert C. Jackson with a pair of MaK engines putting out 6,250 hp as the Paul R. Tregurtha's pair of MaK's that put out 16,080, but that still averages out at 20 million a hull.

Skimping out to save a million dollars on such an expensive project by reusing old engines like the two Pielstick 10PC diesels in the Algolake (Which knowing Pielstick engines, likely are at the end of their life), doesn't make economic sense.

You're saving perhaps 10% of the cost of the project, but you're now going to have spend money to remove the engines from the retired ship which will eat up some of that minimum savings. And in return, you quite possibly are getting a ship back that will cost more to run and be more unreliable to operate today than overhauling and reactivating the old steam plant would've cost.

[Denny]

Not sure though how much life would be left in the engines though of the Algolake and Algoma Olympic? Sorry if that sound funny and odd but, each of these two have spent their share of time hauling salt cargoes in their career and have traveled alot on saltwater trips out to the Seaway and back. My point here that I am trying to make and in a sensible way is, salt does not do a hull good and not sure as well how salt does on ship's engines as well? Granted your idea does sound good not saying anything against that of course it's just that I don't know how much those engines took with all of the salt they carried and trips through the Seaway and back also? Maybe someone else will have a better handle of what I am trying to say and come up with? I do like your idea though on the engine.

[Guest]

Algoma should hang on to the American Victory. Her greatest shortcoming (being a steamer) could be remedied by giving her the Diesel plant from the Algolake or Algoma Olympic. I was on the Victory in her last year as an O-N boat. I went all over her (from the tip of her stubby foremast, to her ballast tanks (which I had the delight of shoveling out)). She has many redundant systems (the engineer's delight) as she was a Navy ship. I worked on ships since 1979, and was a few years from getting my 3rd's (Deck) ticket, so the 2nd engineer's opinion & my experience told me she was built like a tank.
The Adam E. Cornelius on the other hand, is a cheaply-built, 1973 AmShip product. She seems to be a problem child. Parker Mellenhausen told me that Inland Steel put a large amount of money into her (when they bareboat-chartered her) but it didn't cure her problems. Friends that worked aboard her told me she had bare-bones accommodations, did not take rough weather well, and had doors & walls out of true (especially when her boom was swung out).
Go with a Dieselized American Victory Algoma, you'll have a much better ship than the Algoma Compass.

The other thing no one is thinking about is that the American Victory can transit the MacArthur Lock at the Soo. Yes I know that President Trump mentioned yesterday the need for another large lock, but the simply facts are the federal government can no longer afford to build it and it's safe to say the shipowners would be unwilling to pay tolls to pay for its construction. Even if the ok was given tomorrow to start construction, a new lock would take 8 to 10 years to build. Keeping a ship like the American Victory and returning her to service is one less ship having to wait her turn to transit the Poe Lock. With Algoma retiring the Algolake, Algoma Olympic and Algosteel this year, that means three fewer hulls capable of using the MacArthur Lock and all their new builds will be 78 feet wide, too wide for the Mac.

[PDBLK25]

Algoma should hang on to the American Victory. Her greatest shortcoming (being a steamer) could be remedied by giving her the Diesel plant from the Algolake or Algoma Olympic. I was on the Victory in her last year as an O-N boat. I went all over her (from the tip of her stubby foremast, to her ballast tanks (which I had the delight of shoveling out)). She has many redundant systems (the engineer's delight) as she was a Navy ship. I worked on ships since 1979, and was a few years from getting my 3rd's (Deck) ticket, so the 2nd engineer's opinion & my experience told me she was built like a tank.
The Adam E. Cornelius on the other hand, is a cheaply-built, 1973 AmShip product. She seems to be a problem child. Parker Mellenhausen told me that Inland Steel put a large amount of money into her (when they bareboat-chartered her) but it didn't cure her problems. Friends that worked aboard her told me she had bare-bones accommodations, did not take rough weather well, and had doors & walls out of true (especially when her boom was swung out).
Go with a Dieselized American Victory Algoma, you'll have a much better ship than the Algoma Compass.

[Jon Paul]

The GULFOIL was 502' long. The hull was lengthened when it was converted to the Middletown.

[Guest]

American Victory certainly has a storied history anyone know why so many of her crew died when she was involved in a collision with another ship i think she was called the Gulfoil then thanks in advance?

Here is the USCG Commandant's Action regarding the Marine Board of Investigation of the collision between Gulfoil and S. E. Graham.

http://www.dco.uscg.mil/Portals/9/DCO%2 ... ulfoil.pdf

The report says 7 crewmen were found in the aft cabins the fire started at the bow could the fire really have spread 700 feet down the hull to the end of the Gulfoil?

Oil based paint. The paint could spread the fire.

[Guest]

A photo of Gulfoil on fire...

http://www.aukevisser.nl/t2tanker/t-tan ... f842b0.jpg

[Guest]

American Victory certainly has a storied history anyone know why so many of her crew died when she was involved in a collision with another ship i think she was called the Gulfoil then thanks in advance?

Here is the USCG Commandant's Action regarding the Marine Board of Investigation of the collision between Gulfoil and S. E. Graham.

http://www.dco.uscg.mil/Portals/9/DCO%2 ... ulfoil.pdf

The report says 7 crewmen were found in the aft cabins the fire started at the bow could the fire really have spread 700 feet down the hull to the end of the Gulfoil?

[Jon Paul]

Here's a nice video of the Middletown plowing through ice on Lake Erie;

http://youtu.be/Lc9uEHdUi-g

Enjoy!!

[Guest]

American Victory certainly has a storied history anyone know why so many of her crew died when she was involved in a collision with another ship i think she was called the Gulfoil then thanks in advance?

Here is the USCG Commandant's Action regarding the Marine Board of Investigation of the collision between Gulfoil and S. E. Graham.

http://www.dco.uscg.mil/Portals/9/DCO%2 ... ulfoil.pdf

Great info thanks.