Doxford Marine Diesel Memories (1 Viewer)

[Tincataylor]

This is a spin off from the “This is an Engine” thread as it appears there are a couple of us on here who remember the mighty Doxford Marine Diesel engine and by giving the subject a thread of its own then it might reach a few others.

My own experience began as a fresh faced lad straight out of a motor trade apprenticeship who managed to join the Royal Fleet Auxiliary as a junior engineering officer. Having seen nothing bigger than a lorry engine my first visit to the ships engine room was totally embarrassing. I remember looking at this huge engine purring away in front of me and saying something stupid like “blimey that's a big engine, how fast does this ship go?” only to be told that the engine I was looking at was a generator,of which the ship had four, and that the main engine was the big grey thing I was casually leaning against. It was just not possible for me to comprehend that this gigantic structure that seemed to fill the whole cavernous engine room was in fact a single engine; but this was not any old engine; no, this was a six cylinder vertically opposed piston Doxford which I was later to fall in love with the way that only saddo engineers can.

Others have brought back memories of measuring bore wear and actually stepping inside the crank case to see how bad the lower piston glands were leaking, as well as the fuel valve set up and all the plumbing that went with it. To give people who have never seen the beast a flavour of its unique qualities it was possible to lie flat on top of one of the pistons (of which there were 12) and to go astern the engine was stopped and then re-started backwards, there 'aint many engines that can do that trick.

One of my favourite memories was, on promotion, being allowed to actually drive the thing, if you've never started a Doxford on 600 psi compressed air and settled her down to her 32 revs per minute “dead slow ahead” before leaving harbour and slowly accelerating to a full speed of 105 revs per minute then you have missed out on one of engineering's great joys.

So, if there are any more of you out there who would like to share a memory or two feel free to come back

Mr Tinca

 

[2x2camper]

Going to be interesting thread, my dad worked for Doxfords for around 20 years till he left in 1980. As a 16 yo he took me round the workshops in Pallion Sunderland,, which were a fascinating place, for a lad of 16.

 

[WillH]

Never had the chance to work with a Doxford. My experience was limited to B&W, MAN and Sulzer. Loved the cathedral engines and missed them when I moved medium speed engines.

^{_{Subscribers  do not see these advertisements}}

 

[34127]

Doxford engineering, a great name in marine engines. In the 1930s they were responsible for over 90% of the worlds marine diesel engines either built on the river Wear or under licence elsewhere.

 

[Stewart J]

First trip to sea in 1970 with Sugar Line and a Doxford in awe of it at full speed but they could be temperamental, the rubber cooling hoses over the moving quadrant guide to the top piston were prone to splitting with the resultant high temperature water spraying everywhere. The large mechanical governor mounted on the end of the engine had a habit of sticking and needed a good belt from a large long handled heavy wooden mallet to sort it, it was quite terrifying to see the engine start to over speed.

 

[Steve and Denise]

Back in 1970 I used to deliver the morning papers to Lady Doxford in Doxford house very very grand at the back door of course always gave me things at Christmas ?

^{_{Subscribers  do not see these advertisements}}

 

[andy63]

Reading your post stirred a few memories..
Not that I did much diesel time.. I was a steam man.. Stal leval steam turbine with foster wheeler roof fired boilers..
Cellular container ships of around 32000 ton and capable of around 22knots...on the Aussie run.. Suez was closed at the time..
In the early 70's they were the largest container ships in the world at the time..
In order to get some motor time in for tickets I got to do a spell on the MV Tabor.. Moss Hutchinson lines..
She had doxfords but alas we were dock bound in Liverpool during a Dockers strike so never got to work them..
Anyone from that era that spent time at south shields marine and tec will surley remember the huge single cylinder opposed piston engine in the doxford shop..
Presented to the college by doxford and played on by cadets.. And every now and then you got to start her up??
They were good times
Andy.

 

[mrh74]

I have Doxford experience from the top side, I was a deck cadet with Furness Withy and spent quite a bit of time on the two Prince Line ships, Crown Prince and Royal Prince, mostly the Crown Prince. They had Doxford vertically opposed engines, which on a few occasions didn’t start too well when needed One instance was 1983ish in Leixoes Portugal. Early morning coming into berth and having to turn within the dock, the pilot brought her in on dead slow ahead. I was up on the forecastle with the lads getting ready to berth. The turn took us towards the fishing piers, which we were slowly and correctly heading towards; the pilot requested dead slow astern to slow us and help the turn. As pointed out above, to do this the engine had to be stopped then re-started running backwards. The first part of that went well, the last bit didn’t

So our slow progress towards the fishing pier and moored fishing boats carried on. I “left” the forecastle as we were about 30 meters from the fishing boats, the look on the face of the fisherman sat on the back end of his boat, enjoying his morning coffee, just before we sliced it in half is something I’ll never forget along with his scramble to get on the pier. We bounced off the pier and then to further add to his distress chewed his nets through the bow thruster, blowing that motor too. The three weeks the ship was compounded were pretty good fun though, nice place to visit Porto ;-)

I also remember another occasion coming out of the Manchester Ship Canal at Ellesmere where again the engine refused to start in reverse. Fortunately the tide in the Mersey was about right with the canal level and when we “pressed” through the lock gate into the Mersey not too much damage was done, although it was a bit hairy floating down the Mersey with no engine.

 

[jockaneezer]

The "Hairy Arsed Fitter" I served my time with was found of spouting "You young 'uns don't know you're born, you wouldn't have lasted 5 minutes in the Tropics, flogging up the con rods on a Doxford !" I think he was with Clan Lines ?

^{_{Subscribers  do not see these advertisements}}

 

[Tincataylor]

Does this ring a bell sung to the tune of MacNamara's Band..........

"Oh my name is William Doxford and I come from Sunder-land

They say my diesel engine is the finest in the land

The pistons bang, the cranks go clang and the camshaft grinds away

And you only have to oil the bugger fifty times a day "

Mr Tinca

 

[Detnor]

The 1903 gatehouse was taken down and put in storage late last year. New road going through the factory location, they hope to put the gatehouse back up as a monument.
My dad was a marine fitter there, came home every day covered in asbestos dust, him and all his workmates were dead before they retired.

 

[2x2camper]

The 1903 gatehouse was taken down and put in storage late last year. New road going through the factory location, they hope to put the gatehouse back up as a monument.
My dad was a marine fitter there, came home every day covered in asbestos dust, him and all his workmates were dead before they retired.

I've liked the post as I was unaware that the gatehouse had been removed. It was never the cleanest place going. Sorry the here about your Dad my Dads hearing is poor now due to the damage sustained there.

^{_{Subscribers  do not see these advertisements}}

 

[John Barrett]

Not a Doxford, but IIRC there was a lovely big Worthington generator at RSME Chatham. It was quite a novel experience to walk around the cylinder heads!
Similar...

 

[DiggerJon]

I’d never realised when I joined MHF that I would be learning about marine diesels! Keep it up fellas, it’s fascinating!

 

[Nomadian]

I was grey funnel line and mainly steam turbine apart from sweepers, the diesels we had were back up generators in case the turbo generator(steam) went down which was often? the diesels were 12 cylinder paxman ventura.

^{_{Subscribers  do not see these advertisements}}

 

[mitzimad]

no peresonal experience but a bloke i knew 20 years ago was on tankers and i was amazed that they could remove a conrod pin the piston up and work on one cylinder while the rest were restarted

 

[Tincataylor]

Well, I am genuinely surprised at the amount of interest this thread has initiated, especially from folk who have no knowledge or experience of a Doxford and, I suspect, had never even heard of one until reading these comments. There are some videos on You Tube of the beasts in motion, but none of them really do justice to the size and scale of the engines. There are also several types of engine as they continued to evolve from their inception, but the one that is dear to my heart had water cooled top pistons and water or oil cooled lower pistons. The link below shows the top pistons in action,



I'll try and give you a flavour of some of the engines oddities. A |Doxford is a vertically opposed 2 stroke diesel engine that ran on fuel called Furnace Fuel Oil. At ambient temperature this stuff was like tar, was very unrefined, and probably contained all the pollutants you could shake a stick at. We had to heat it to well over 100 Fahrenheit ( I think it may have been 160) and it was supplied to the fuel valves via a common fuel rail under a pressure of some 6000psi. The fuel valves were similar to the injectors on a modern diesel only they were opened by a camshaft and closed under the pressure of a bloody big spring. We would burn around 30 tons of fuel every 24 hours.

The engine was started by blasting compressed air at 600psi into whichever cylinder was in the firing position, this kicked the engine over and almost simultaneously fuel was admitted to the cylinder and the girl was in motion at her tick over speed of about 32rpm.

The propeller shaft was coupled directly to the crankshaft so in order to go astern the engine was stopped and restarted in the opposite direction. To do this the driver had to raise all the fuel valve cam followers from the camshaft by a hydraulic lift, and then slide the whole camshaft along, via a lever like the ones in a train signal box, to a new set of “astern” cams and then lower the cam followers back down to the camshaft. The engine was then started as before only this time it ran “backwards”.

OK, I've probably said enough for one post, I'll post more if I see a continuing appetite for it,

Mr Tinca

 

[68c]

The 1903 gatehouse was taken down and put in storage late last year. New road going through the factory location, they hope to put the gatehouse back up as a monument.
My dad was a marine fitter there, came home every day covered in asbestos dust, him and all his workmates were dead before they retired.

I clicked on 'Like', then thought actually that is the last emotion in my mind, a 'Sympathy' button would have been better.

^{_{Subscribers  do not see these advertisements}}

 

[jockaneezer]

Stewart J, I see what you mean about the rubber pipe and quadrant after watching the video Tincataylor posted. Did they ever come up with an improvement for it ? That rubber pipe constantly flexing is a failure waiting to happen ? They'd probably use a ceramic faced mechanical seal nowadays ? I've changed some Deublin ceramic rotary couplings on the con rods of tyre curing presses that handled 600psi steam, but they didn't have to operate at the speeds shown in the video.

 

[34127]

Thanks for the video Tincataylor

I believe the Doxford diesel engine was designed to run on low grade fuel and was more economical and very smooth running compared to others. The J type engine was designed by Percy Jackson (as was the earlier P engine) and there was, and may be still, a J engine in the Beamish museum in County Durham ( a great place to visit if you are in the area).

I find the whole history of Diesel engines is in itself interesting and with intrigue such as the mystery death of Dr Rudolf Diesel in 1913

Inventor Rudolf Diesel vanishes

On September 29, 1913, Rudolf Diesel, inventor of the engine that bears his name, disappears from the steamship Dresden while traveling from Antwerp, Belgium to Harwich, England. On October 10, a Belgian sailor aboard a North Sea steamer spotted a body floating in the water; upon further...

www.history.com

 

[Brains]

For those that like 1960's marine diesels, and fancy a fascinating day out in Hamburg, then I'd recommend a visit to the CAP SAN DIEGO, 1962 built tween, which is the world largest seaworthy museum ship.

^{_{Subscribers  do not see these advertisements}}

 

[PeteH]

If you are ever in San-Francisco The last remaining seaworthy Liberty Ship is Berthed there, If I can find it I have (I think) some footage taken aboard in 2004. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_Jeremiah_O'Brien

As For the Upper Coolant hoses on the earlier Doxfords. Trying to shut the cock to stop the water was an "experience" to say the least to avoid getting flailed by a hose flapping about and spraying scalding water!.

A few Memories?.

Still Have the "library"

From "Southerns"

Above:- Sample of Indicator card Taken Mid 70`s. If you look carefully you can just make out the pressure outline in the dots

More From "Southerns"

Adventurer, Owned by T&J Harrison, She had a 300ton Lift Stulcan Derrick. We loaded the Locmotive(s) Owned by the Artist David Sheppard, and brought them back to the UK from South Africa as deck cargo.

 

[DuxDeluxe]

Reading your post stirred a few memories..
Not that I did much diesel time.. I was a steam man.. Stal leval steam turbine with foster wheeler roof fired boilers..
Cellular container ships of around 32000 ton and capable of around 22knots...on the Aussie run.. Suez was closed at the time..
In the early 70's they were the largest container ships in the world at the time..
In order to get some motor time in for tickets I got to do a spell on the MV Tabor.. Moss Hutchinson lines..
She had doxfords but alas we were dock bound in Liverpool during a Dockers strike so never got to work them..
Anyone from that era that spent time at south shields marine and tec will surley remember the huge single cylinder opposed piston engine in the doxford shop..
Presented to the college by doxford and played on by cadets.. And every now and then you got to start her up??
They were good times
Andy.

South Shields was great. Did all my (deck) tickets up there and by some fluke got them all first time.

 

[DuxDeluxe]

If you are ever in San-Francisco The last remaining seaworthy Liberty Ship is Berthed there, If I can find it I have (I think) some footage taken aboard in 2004. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_Jeremiah_O'Brien

Almost “used to be” The last......... Big fire last night at fisherman’s wharf and the Jeremiah O’Brien got a bit scorched

^{_{Subscribers  do not see these advertisements}}

 

[andy63]

South Shields was great. Did all my (deck) tickets up there and by some fluke got them all first time.

You obviously didn't spend enough time in the fine establishments of the town..passed First time... Never herd the likes.??
I'm trying to remember them ..can you help????
It was a long time ago but I remember these for starters..
Shoreline ... Lastrada.. Cat.. Yellow welly..
Latino.. ..hmm I'm sure there were others ?
I was there as a container fleets engineer cadet from end of 1969 to end of 1972..
You are right ..they were good times..so good I ended up staying here as did many from that time..
Andy..

 

[DuxDeluxe]

You obviously didn't spend enough time in the fine establishments of the town..passed First time... Never herd the likes.??
I'm trying to remember them ..can you help????
It was a long time ago but I remember these for starters..
Shoreline ... Lastrada.. Cat.. Yellow welly..
Latino.. ..hmm I'm sure there were others ?
I was there as a container fleets engineer cadet from end of 1969 to end of 1972..
You are right ..they were good times..so good I ended up staying here as did many from that time..
Andy..

You forgot Rupert’s..... and the County Hotel at Westoe. Apparently still the establishment of choice for pharmaceutical products so a friend who lives there tells me.

saw Showaddywaddy in the Chelsea Cat before they were famous. Really entertaining

 

[34127]

You obviously didn't spend enough time in the fine establishments of the town..passed First time... Never herd the likes.??
I'm trying to remember them ..can you help????
It was a long time ago but I remember these for starters..
Shoreline ... Lastrada.. Cat.. Yellow welly..
Latino.. ..hmm I'm sure there were others ?
I was there as a container fleets engineer cadet from end of 1969 to end of 1972..
You are right ..they were good times..so good I ended up staying here as did many from that time..
Andy..

I remember the Latino, La Strada and Chelsea Cat and there was one underneath a car park, can't remember the name (might have been the Jungle) but you only went there when you couldn't get into any of the others. They were very popular and had to queue to get in. The Latino used to be a casino as well as a nightclub and dress rules meant you had to wear a jacket at all times, to make it harder to fight as this was not unusual.

^{_{Subscribers  do not see these advertisements}}

 

[34127]

You forgot Rupert’s..... and the County Hotel at Westoe. Apparently still the establishment of choice for pharmaceutical products so a friend who lives there tells me.

saw Showaddywaddy in the Chelsea Cat before they were famous. Really entertaining

I also saw Showwaddywaddy, must have been the same time, but I remember them as being in the Latino, which changed its name but can't remember what to. Those were the days.

Edit; I think the Latino changed name to the Tavern

 

[PeteH]

You forgot Rupert’s..... and the County Hotel at Westoe. Apparently still the establishment of choice for pharmaceutical products so a friend who lives there tells me.

saw Showaddywaddy in the Chelsea Cat before they were famous. Really entertaining

"Dined" in the County, as recently as 2017. Grandson Graduated from the college and we went up to see him. Finished up with a load of his buddies, drinking there. Well known back in the 60`s as the place where many drowned their sorrows or celebrated after doing "Orals". I sailed with many who graduated from there, I did all mine at Hull, as I could do it from Home, Where the equivalent establishment was the Queens Hotel. The "shoreline" was going in the 60`s, as was Latino or La Strada I believe?. Spent a lot of time in Redheads Yard, early 70`s. standing by Strick Line Ships. Either dry docking or new build too. There was a Boozer at the corner that was known as the "Office", as it was where the Superintendent(s) spent most of the day!, and where you went if he was needed!.

 

[Boringfrog]

All this talk of Sunderland is making me a proud "Makam". Here's a short video of the works going on around the old Doxfords yard at present and apparently you can see the gatehouse been removed, not 100% sure if it's been saved or destroyed.Doxford video

^{_{Subscribers  do not see these advertisements}}