Steam and Stuff

[vasnipe]

Originally Posted by BigHomey

Saw this in a WW2 exhibit at the NAS Pensacola Aviation Museum. I may have to make on for the RV.

Attachment 207995

Brings back memories of the Water hours on board my first ship. The boilers took priority for fresh water production so when one of our evaporators / desalinization units acted up personal fresh water use dropped. You take a SERIOUS Navy shower like that one. You get caught wasting water and end up in the engine room with us sweaty/dirty/nasty Snipes (engineers) making that fresh water. Folks only did that once and word got around and it stopped. We had two 12,000 Gallon Per Day evaporators to feed a crew of about 250 and 2 thirsty 1200 psi boilers...

[Iwannacamp]

Originally Posted by vasnipe

Brings back memories of the Water hours on board my first ship. The boilers took priority for fresh water production so when one of our evaporators / desalinization units acted up personal fresh water use dropped. You take a SERIOUS Navy shower like that one. You get caught wasting water and end up in the engine room with us sweaty/dirty/nasty Snipes (engineers) making that fresh water. Folks only did that once and word got around and it stopped. We had two 12,000 Gallon Per Day evaporators to feed a crew of about 250 and 2 thirsty 1200 psi boilers...

Lord have mercy.... 1200# steam?

I serve the pulp and paper and lumber companies at work...we never see above 1000# of steam....people stay miles away from that.

[rockfordroo]

Originally Posted by Iwannacamp

Lord have mercy.... 1200# steam?

I serve the pulp and paper and lumber companies at work...we never see above 1000# of steam....people stay miles away from that.

Electric power plants routinely run at those pressures.

[Iwannacamp]

Originally Posted by rockfordroo

Electric power plants routinely run at those pressures.

Dang it. I sell a little to a few power plants, but I never knew that. I think the bulk of their power is from coal......ooooooooo bad.

[TheWolfPaq82]

Originally Posted by Iwannacamp

Dang it. I sell a little to a few power plants, but I never knew that. I think the bulk of their power is from coal......ooooooooo bad.

Coal, Natural Gas, Nuclear.....all make steam to drive the turbines to produce power. Hydro plants are the only one's that don't rely on steam, but still use water to produce power. Guess you can throw Solar and Wind into those also.

[pgandw]

Originally Posted by rockfordroo

Electric power plants routinely run at those pressures.

Problem on ships is any steam leak is a killer. Invisible, cuts like the sharpest knife you have ever seen. When I was first assigned to the engine room, I saw old timers walking between the turbines holding a broom handle in front of them. I thought they were playing a joke on the newbies - like Boy Scout snipe hunts, and being sent to hunt for 50ft of shore line - until I saw half a broom handle fall to the deck, and an emergency shutdown declared.

Fred W

[vasnipe]

Originally Posted by pgandw

Problem on ships is any steam leak is a killer. Invisible, cuts like the sharpest knife you have ever seen. When I was first assigned to the engine room, I saw old timers walking between the turbines holding a broom handle in front of them. I thought they were playing a joke on the newbies - like Boy Scout snipe hunts, and being sent to hunt for 50ft of shore line - until I saw half a broom handle fall to the deck, and an emergency shutdown declared.

Fred W

Correct.
We could hear the leak but not see the plume. 1200 psig 950F dry steam was vapor and invisible. Wave the corn broom sweep part around and when it deflected or burst into flame you were close. Beat the flames out then wave the stick around and when it was cut off you were there. Depending, we would draw big circle with grease pencil to fix.
Chris
USS Bagley FF-1069
USS Constellation CV-64
MMC(SW)(RET)



My apologies for sending thread off topic.

Now back to our regularly scheduled program...

[Iwannacamp]

Originally Posted by pgandw

Problem on ships is any steam leak is a killer. Invisible, cuts like the sharpest knife you have ever seen. When I was first assigned to the engine room, I saw old timers walking between the turbines holding a broom handle in front of them. I thought they were playing a joke on the newbies - like Boy Scout snipe hunts, and being sent to hunt for 50ft of shore line - until I saw half a broom handle fall to the deck, and an emergency shutdown declared.

Fred W

I have heard about the broom. Superheated steam is invisible as I hear. It was funny to me how temp rise slows down after it gets so hot. 50 psi 300 deg, 100 psi 340 and so on. One would think 1000 lb steam would be 2000 deg or something close.

We had a customer call and wanted some materials. I asked what the service was? He said chilled steam. We still laugh about that.

We stock, but hardly ever sell any sky hooks. 4-12” galvanized and epoxy coated

We do sell a few tail chains up to 7/8” ...thought that was a joke too.

[waybeck2018]

Originally Posted by rockfordroo

Electric power plants routinely run at those pressures.

I was on several ships with 1200 lb steam systems. In fact, was a welder at the time, welded many of them on the old boys.

[waybeck2018]

Originally Posted by Iwannacamp

I have heard about the broom. Superheated steam is invisible as I hear. It was funny to me how temp rise slows down after it gets so hot. 50 psi 300 deg, 100 psi 340 and so on. One would think 1000 lb steam would be 2000 deg or something close.

We had a customer call and wanted some materials. I asked what the service was? He said chilled steam. We still laugh about that.

We stock, but hardly ever sell any sky hooks. 4-12” galvanized and epoxy coated

We do sell a few tail chains up to 7/8” ...thought that was a joke too.

Never used a broom, but saw super heated steam in action, or the effects of it. I was in the vicinity when USS Frank Evans was hit by the Australian aircraft carrier. Forward section of the ship went down, and we were sent in to do R&A on the after half that stayed afloat, more accurately described as body recovery. Steam obliterated skin from the bones. Bad, bad experience.
Had a BT friend who got caught by 600 lb steam. He barely survived and was never the same. He refused to go back in the Fire Room (boiler room) so he did the remainder of his time , about three years as an Engineering Admin type so he could get his 20 in.

[Iwannacamp]

I was thought anything over 15# was considered high pressure in HVAC school. We have people come/call and ask for stuff and say man it’s gotta be steam rated... then I say how much steam? Sometimes the answer will be 20-30-50# and in like [emoji23][emoji23] everything I have except PVC and CPVC is rated higher than that. The highest we stock is 1690# rated and F-22.

[gastan]

Originally Posted by vasnipe

You get caught wasting water and end up in the engine room with us sweaty/dirty/nasty Snipes (engineers) ...

A little off topic but - - as a Navy Radioman striker, one of my jobs was to take a clipboard around and have incoming messages signed off by the relevant officers. Chased the Engineering Officer down into the engine room once. ONCE. yasnipe is right - - snipes work in hot/sweaty/dirty/nasty (and noisy) conditions. After that one trip into the bowels of the ship, if the big snipe was anywhere below, I waited until he surfaced before grabbing him.