Volume Six - Pre-Victorian to the Present Day - Select Aspects - The Royal Navy and Royal Naval Reserve Fleet at Penarth Dock

The ideal aimed at is 30 per cent. relative humidity, which is considerably below that at which corrosion and deterioration of metals takes place. This may not be achieved with the first desiccation as so much depends on the weather experienced whilst the actual job is being progressed. Again, although the plastic is quite robust and will stand normal wear and tear, it is easily damaged by careless handling of wires and bulky stores, etc.

To deal with damaged packages, redesiccation, etc., the Reserve Fleet packaging party maintains a repair unit, self-contained with its own equipment launch, which can deal with all except the largest repair jobs.

Stores - This packaging process is quite a costly one, but when the man-hours saved in the normal maintenance are considered, the initial cost becomes really worth while.

Each ship when she is operating at sea must be self-contained and have on board all the stores which she may need for a period of months. The stores organisation in any ship is therefore a complex one. Here in the Reserve Fleet a team of trained stores ratings work under the direction of the supply officers and check list, and stow all the stores in each ship.

Obviously such stores as food and certain perishable goods are not placed in ships in reserve, but even so, more than 7,000 items from pin-sized screws to the anchor and cables must be carefully checked and placed in their correct stowage ready for the day when the ship may have to steam away. The system must be such that the men on joining the ship on commissioning will have no difficulty in finding any one of these many items. Rapid supply of spare parts plays an important part in the ship's fighting efficiency; for example, a small valve for a radio set may fail in action, and a vital part of the ship's equipment be put out of commission until the spare can be supplied and fitted.

Conclusion - Those of you who have walked round the Reserve Fleet ships during Navy Days will have seen how spick and span they are inside, and how everything is ready for the ship's company to march on board and turn a "ghost ship" into a real live thing.

Our motto, not yet latinised is: "We may bend but never break." Portsmouth Navy News [262] October 1954. In my experience, however, whenever something bends it is subject to fatigue and eventually breaks!