Transition from Wood to Iron in Shipbuilding

by the start of the 19th century wooden ships had been plying the seas for millennia when the famous great western crossed the atlantic as the first purpose-built steam-powered ocean liner in 1838 most trans-oceanic passengers would still be traveling by sale for quite some time a ship called the rainbow had been completed the year before in 1837 and was built entirely from iron rainbow serviced coastal waters primarily traveling between london and antwerp but the great western a paddle wheeler built for the open atlantic was constructed of wood this was indicative of the fact that the acceptance of iron into the world of shipbuilding did not happen overnight but rather incrementally over the course of many years the first way in which iron found itself onto ocean-going ships was in the form of structural reinforcement on already existing ships wood of course is not as strong as iron and ocean-going ships beyond a certain length were prone to permanent warping of the hull in the form of hogging and sagging caused by the differing amounts of support at the bow stern and center of the hull as the ship traveled over a wave over time this warping of the hull would become permanent shipbuilders of course knew this and the length of ships therefore was limited so as to reduce the effect of hogging and sagging additionally wooden ships could not remain in service forever without undergoing major and prohibitively expensive repairs so to extend the life of their ships many ship owners had their ships reinforced with iron supports which were meant to supplement the original diagonal riders whose purpose were to reduce the effect of hogging and sagging around the same time some shipbuilders were beginning to develop the understanding and skills necessary to build new ships partially from iron these ships usually built with iron frames instead of wooden ribs are called composite ships the skins of these composite ships retained their composure of wooden planks composite ships came with a variety of benefits most obvious they were stronger and had the potential to outlive their all wooden counterparts composite ships were also lighter than they might have been because less iron was needed to provide the same support as wood perhaps the most subtle benefit of composite ships was that they offered more usable internal volume than wooden ships of the same dimensions this is because less space was occupied by the iron reinforcements because of the economic benefits many composite ships were built even in the future when fully iron ships were commonplace composite ships would still be built particularly in north america where lumber was abundant and iron was expensive but once iron found itself into shipyards it did not take long for ironhold ships to appear in 1839 the history making great western was on route to new york it was a routine voyage for her but she was sharing her shipping lane with the next ship to make history a fully ironed steamer with a schooner rig named robert f stockton she was a minuscule ship of less than 35 tons and just about 70 feet long but when she arrived in new york she became the first ironhold ship to cross the atlantic albeit mostly under sale even though the press did not give her much attention her voyage was a sign of things to come but it would be the previously mentioned rainbow which would inspire the next step in shipbuilding the great western shipping company the same company which owned the ss great western had a new ship on order the ss great britain the great britain was being designed by the famously ambitious revolutionary isimbard brunel brunel had recently traveled aboard the rainbow which must have impressed him because he later convinced the company to allow him to build the great britain with iron and a screw propeller even though she had been designed as a wood and hold paddle wheeler like her fleetmate great western great britain became the first iron ship to cross the atlantic under the power of a screw propeller in this sense she was the embodiment of modern shipping the ss great britain was a commercial failure but she demonstrated the structural integrity of iron ships when she was beached after just a few voyages she spent the winter enduring the brutal weather on the harsh irish coast but was salvaged and returned to service for many years after by now the naval powers of the world were beginning to take notice of the changes underway the united states navy began building a fully iron ship in 1842 and the next year the uss michigan was launched she was relatively small and intended only to patrol the great lakes but bear in mind that the conditions on the great lakes can rival those in the atlantic under the right circumstances the uss michigan was designed as an auxiliary schooner and was capable of making eight knots under steam she battled lumber pirates on the great lakes but never saw battle in the civil war and was broken up for scrap across the pond in europe the french navy launched a wooden frigate named glory in 1859 although she was wooden she was armored with iron and was the first iron-clad warship in the world and she prompted a response from britain the royal navy recognized the threat and began working on an iron ship of their own their ship though would be of an iron hull not just plated with iron armor the french were still ahead though because the french navy had just laid down an iron hold ship of their own but the royal navy was able to launch their iron ship before france despite getting a late start this arms race between britain and france to develop a fleet of iron ships was validated in march of 1862 when the first battle between ironclads took place as part of the american civil war the south had captured a northern steam frigate named merrimack and converted it to an ironclad warship the result was a makeshift looking vessel said to have been described as quote a floating barn roof but the merrimack now called virginia attacked and destroyed a fleet of northern wooden warships virginia herself sailed away unscathed the north confronted the virginia with her own ironclad called the monitor she too was an unconventional ship with her main deck just barely above the waterline the monitor in virginia battled awkwardly and largely ineffectually but virginia was able to land a blow on her opponent marking the end of the first battle between ironclads although the battle was not important in and of itself it marked a turning point in naval history ironclads were the future and any wooden warships left would be highly vulnerable if caught in an encounter with an iron ship but unlike naval ships merchant ships did not have the need to defend themselves from their commercial rivals composite and even wooden ships continued to be built for years there were many reasons for this for starters the united states was still the leader in shipbuilding at the time and as previously mentioned lumber was abundant in north america as a result many new ships were being built with a plentiful and thus inexpensive lumber that was available another reason is that sailing ships and auxiliary ships those powered by both steam and sail were still popular at the time due in part to the perception that steam engines were unreliable since one of the benefits of iron hold ships was the greater resistance to vibration caused by screw propellers the need for iron chips was reduced even if only by a small amount the famous british clipper cuddysark completed at the late date of 1870 was a composite ship herself eventually though as wood became more expensive and iron less expensive and as the need for larger ships grew merchant shipbuilders had to adapt in order to survive no longer limited to a certain length or by the amount of resistance the sails could overcome the limiting factor of the size of ships became the shipyards in which they were built but with reliability and speed on the rise the pressures of demand and economies of scale were enough to spark an explosion in ship size which seemed to grow almost exponentially this would have been impossible without the transition to iron ships regardless of economic pressures in the midst of changing shipbuilding techniques and practices iron itself was changing iron although strong can be made even stronger by removing the impurities it contains namely carbon cast iron for example can contain between two and a half percent and four and a half percent carbon but by processing the iron so as to reduce the carbon content you can create steel while the history of steel goes back thousands of years there is no easy method for turning iron into steel and the process did not become efficient until the 1860s by the 1880s iron ships were being quietly phased out as they were retired their replacements were steel ships which were easier to build safer to sail on and longer lasting to own the advent and implementation of iron hold ships in conjunction with that of screw propulsion brought the world into the age of maritime technology in which we find ourselves today yes there have been incremental improvements since and traveling aboard the ss great britain is a far cry from traveling aboard say late 20th century liners like the queen elizabeth ii but at the end of the day ships today are still constructed of steel and driven by screw propellers [Music] [Music] [Music] you

Channel: The Great Big Move

Views: 282,367

Keywords: ocean liner, titanic, wooden hull, wood hull, iron hull, metal hull, metal ship, iron ship, steel hull, steel ship, steam, steamship, steam ship, sailing ship, ironclad, monitor Merrimack, monitor and Merrimack, Merrimack, merrimac, shipbuilding

Id: NCiYQqwSsb4

Length: 9min 43sec (583 seconds)

Published: Thu Jul 16 2020