The engine room proper housed the main turbines that drove the Caronia's propellers. At the
forward end of this space, occupying a height of 3 decks was the Starting Platform.
For the purposes of this tour the “Engine Room” comprises the whole of what is usually
termed the “machinery spaces”. Working aft, the turbo-generator room was ahead of
the boiler room, with the starting platform and turbines aft of that. The Engine Room itself
comprised of the huge turbines which drove the propellers.
[ These images require min. 1024 pixel screen width ]
The Starting Platform Controls
The Starting Platform
[Photo: Art & Industry magazine 1949]
[Left:]
Photo shows the Starting Platform taken from the starboard side looking across to port.
On the right (forward side), is the log desk and just behind it is the phone booth.
On the left (aft side) is the Main Control Gauge Board Panel.
Behind the Control Panel is the port and starboard steam turbine plus the Reduction Gears (One
per shaft) The three control valve handwheels (just behind the stairway) are for controlling
propeller shaft speed (RPM) and direction (Forward or Aft) One valve is for forward direction,
one is for going aft and the third one is the steam valve by-pass. The three shown closest to
camera are for the starboard engine.
Robin Chalmers writes…
The steps led up to an access walkway alongside the main steam turbines. That led to a platform that
gave us access to the main inclined ladder out of the engine room and into the working alleyway.
The vertical rods were about 1½ inches diameter solid steel reach rods attached to a
universal joint at the top connected to the main steam valves. The large handwheels would
be turned clockwise to open and counter clockwise to close. They were not that difficult to
operate but you had to keep up with maintenance; i.e. grease their bearings.
Robin continues… The Telegraph Described
The telegraph is located just above the handwheel between the middle reach rod and the far one.
(It looks like a piece of pie in the photo)
The Bridge would send down a command which would show up on the engine room telegraph. Any changes would set a
bell ringing. The engineer would acknowledge these by activating the needle pointer into the segment for the
desired command and the ringing would stop. He would then start turning the handwheels to accomplish the command.
Robin continues… Heat in the Boiler Room
I was one of the watch engineers in the boiler room during the Summer and Autumn Cruises in 1964. There
would be one engineer and three firemen per watch.
I once measured the temperature as a matter of interest. When I stood under the large blower fan it was 110° F;
the rest of the space was about 125° F.
In Port and Leaving
The ship's props would not turn during dock side shut-down, however the reduction gear would be disconnected
and the shafts turned ¼ of a revolution every 15 minutes with the “Barring Gear” electric motor.
It was always very busy when we entered or left the docks. The Engine Room would have the watch
second engineer, one platform third engineer, one junior engineer and two greasers.
The Generator Room had one engineer and one greaser. Two extra engineers were used for operating the ships
movement at the handwheels I mentioned above. (This was called going on standby and was the same procedure
if we ran into fog)
