UK’s biggest warship suffers propeller shaft damage off south coast after setting sail for US

[Frogmogman]

Poor design, probably in an attempt to save money...
Didn't these things have major shaft water leaks before.

It does make me laugh, because as a student I was working at Contessa yachts when the Contessa 38s were in build for the Royal Navy.

They sent down a propellor shaft expert from the RCNC, who spent a whole day giving Jeremy Rogers the third degree on the hardness of the prop shafts, even though the build was being done under the auspices of a Lloyd’s surveyor.

Did they send down an expert to check on the rig and sails (on what are, after all, auxiliary yachts) ?

No.

I guess they didn’t have an available expert for that.

 

[penfold]

The most likely explanation is fishing line/rope in the seal.

Poor design, probably in an attempt to save money...
Didn't these things have major shaft water leaks before.

And you came by this pearl of wisdom how?

 

[SaltIre]

The most likely explanation is fishing line/rope in the seal.
And you came by this pearl of wisdom how?

Which pearl of wisdom - "poor design" or the shaft leak?
HMS Queen Elizabeth: Water leak on aircraft carrier 'neck-high'

 

[SaltIre]

Since the current problem is with HMS Prince of Wales might the problem be a leek?

 

[Poignard]

Since the current problem is with HMS Prince of Wales might the problem be a leek?

Coat!

 

[Aeolus]

The Q said: Poor design, probably in an attempt to save money...
Didn't these things have major shaft water leaks before.

The most likely explanation is fishing line/rope in the seal.
And you came by this pearl of wisdom how?

Aircraft carrier can be disabled by a fishing line or rope. And you don't consider that to be poor design?

I accept that my boat can be so disabled but I did spend a little bit less than £2 billion on it.

Just for the heck of it, I did a calculation. For the price of one PoW, I could buy every single Seamaster 925 ever built, 600 times over.

 

[Biggles Wader]

If modern capital ships can be disabled by a bit of string perhaps we should be investing our billions in different technology.
If it isnt a bit of string we should be investing in engines and prop systems that work. The track record on that is poor. I wonder what else doesnt work.

 

[capnsensible]

This worked.

Photo essay – the Carrier Strike Group – from the Pacific to the Arabian Sea | Navy Lookout

For those interested, that's one in a series of photo essays from last year.

 

[Fr J Hackett]

The Q said: Poor design, probably in an attempt to save money...
Didn't these things have major shaft water leaks before.



Aircraft carrier can be disabled by a fishing line or rope. And you don't consider that to be poor design?

I accept that my boat can be so disabled but I did spend a little bit less than £2 billion on it.

Just for the heck of it, I did a calculation. For the price of one PoW, I could buy every single Seamaster 925 ever built, 600 times over.

But would one want to?

 

[Rum_Pirate]

Recall hearing of a US navy vessel moored close to a HMS navy vessel.

One morning, a large tarpaulin was seen hung over the side of US navy vessel with the words 'USN SECOND TO NONE'.

A couple hours later there was a large tarpaulin was seen hung over the side of the HMS navy vessel with the words 'HMS NONE'.






True or urban legend/myth?

 

[Bouba]

The Q said: Poor design, probably in an attempt to save money...
Didn't these things have major shaft water leaks before.



Aircraft carrier can be disabled by a fishing line or rope. And you don't consider that to be poor design?

I accept that my boat can be so disabled but I did spend a little bit less than £2 billion on it.

Just for the heck of it, I did a calculation. For the price of one PoW, I could buy every single Seamaster 925 ever built, 600 times over.

Actually not true...unlike carriers with cat and traps, the PoW doesn’t have to turn into the wind to launch her aircraft..she can do it tied up in port...so quite a lot of redundancy there

 

[SaltyC]

Probably more poor build quality / quality control, supervision. Poor maintenance and a lack of skills both onshore (shipyard) and onboard. Cost cutting through lack of knowledge in search of profit may also contribute.

 

[Bouba]

The Q said: Poor design, probably in an attempt to save money...
Didn't these things have major shaft water leaks before.



Aircraft carrier can be disabled by a fishing line or rope. And you don't consider that to be poor design?

I accept that my boat can be so disabled but I did spend a little bit less than £2 billion on it.

Just for the heck of it, I did a calculation. For the price of one PoW, I could buy every single Seamaster 925 ever built, 600 times over.

In fact here is a very interesting story..
A 1982 war in the remote south Atlantic almost sparked the first aircraft-carrier clash since World War II

 

[Gibeltarik]

Transposed from independent thread to this by moderators.


What causes damage to a propeller/shaft on a very large, five year old vessel/aircraft carrier e.g. 65,000 tonnes ?

• Sabotage?
• Lack of lubrication?
• Diplomatic reasons ?
• Lack of maintenance?
• Hitting a drifting WWII mine?
• Inadvertently hitting a hard (known or unknown) submerged object?
• Not having a rope/line stripper/cutter installed ?
• Getting an unmarked fish pot line wrapped around it?
• Wrong material used in manufacture of shaft and/or bearings?

Your suggestion(s) ?




.
Aircraft Carrier Prince of Wales

Back in the 1970s we managed to write off HMS Dundas by slapping the screw against South Railway Jetty in Portsmouth and bending the A bracket. Just saying .......I was the MEO not the driver!

 

[SaltIre]

In fact here is a very interesting story..
A 1982 war in the remote south Atlantic almost sparked the first aircraft-carrier clash since World War II

Well yes indeed. Had 1st & 2nd May 1982 not had "dead wind" north of the Falklands the Argentinian Navy might have wiped out a significant proportion of the Carrier Battle Group with air and exocet attacks. Their aircraft couldn't get airborne, General Belgrano was sunk and the fleet withdrew to Argentina.

 

[steadyeddy]

Parts made in China.

 

[Kukri]

Parts made in China.

The gantry crane used to build the two carriers was indeed made in China by ZPMC and dismantled and taken back to China when they were finished. We don’t know how to make them, here.

Almost every ship in the world has a propeller shaft or sometimes two.

Cruise ships have Azipods and harbour tugs have either pods or Voith Schneider gear but almost every other ship has a tail shaft.

Only British carriers seem to have recurring troubles with theirs

The ships I get to play with put 69,000hp down their shafts and have done so without drama for twenty years and more now. The QE and POW put 54,000 hp down each shaft.

A friend reminded me this morning that when we were colleagues responsible for building a big ship in a yard that now makes television series and whose gantry cranes were made by Krupp the yard almost made a mess of the tail shaft installation, and were saved from their own carelessness and ignorance by a colleague of ours, who also had to show them how to chock a large main engine. That would have been the last but one big tail shaft in a British yard before the carriers. Having sorted one out he was asked to supervise the intervening one at the same yard.

Probably just coincidence.

 

[Frogmogman]

Well yes indeed. Had 1st & 2nd May 1982 not had "dead wind" north of the Falklands the Argentinian Navy might have wiped out a significant proportion of the Carrier Battle Group with air and exocet attacks. Their aircraft couldn't get airborne, General Belgrano was sunk and the fleet withdrew to Argentina.

Highly recommend Sandy Woodward’s book One hundred days and Jeremy Black’s There and back for more insight on this.

 

[SaltIre]

Highly recommend Sandy Woodward’s book One hundred days and Jeremy Black’s There and back for more insight on this.

Indeed. I've read both - and lots of others.

 

[Bouba]

The gantry crane used to build the two carriers was indeed made in China by ZPMC and dismantled and taken back to China when they were finished. We don’t know how to make them, here.

Almost every ship in the world has a propeller shaft or sometimes two.

Cruise ships have Azipods and harbour tugs have either pods or Voith Schneider gear but almost every other ship has a tail shaft.

Only British carriers seem to have recurring troubles with theirs

The ships I get to play with put 69,000hp down their shafts and have done so without drama for twenty years and more now. The QE and POW put 54,000 hp down each shaft.

A friend reminded me this morning that when we were colleagues responsible for building a big ship in a yard that now makes television series and whose gantry cranes were made by Krupp the yard almost made a mess of the tail shaft installation, and were saved from their own carelessness and ignorance by a colleague of ours, who also had to show them how to chock a large main engine. That would have been the last but one big tail shaft in a British yard before the carriers. Having sorted one out he was asked to supervise the intervening one at the same yard.

Probably just coincidence.

After her sea trials...the QE sailed around the world. All will be fixed...it always is