Volume Ten - Pre-Victorian to the present day - even more aspects - The Patent for the Penarth Slipway - 1881 . . .

Mr. T. B. Lightfoot cont'd :

He did not think it was correct to say that the launching of a vessel was one of the crucial epochs of its existence. It appeared to him that the process of launching was as much a matter of course as the putting in of the rivets ; accidents in launching were unknown nowadays, except in a very few instances through gross carelessness.

He did not consider that the hauling up of a vessel like the “ City of Rome ” would present any great difficulty. The question of constructing slipways for the largest vessels was purely a commercial one, and if it could be shown that such an establishment would be likely to pay, he would have no hesitation in carrying it out.

The difficulty would be in getting a sufficient number of large vessels to keep the slip fully occupied, as it obviously would be undesirable to use machinery designed for 6,000-ton vessels, for those of only 2,000 tons, excepting in rare cases. This appeared to be the obstacle to the construction of very large slipways.

The particulars of wages in hauling up a vessel of 2,500 tons at Penarth were not hypothetical, but taken from a real case, the gross weight of vessel being nearly 2,400 tons.

He did not think Mr. Summers’s remarks had modified the statements made in the Paper respecting Day and Summer’s gear. So for, it had only been used in two small slips ; and at Ayr, where it was now under construction, the weight of vessel to be dealt with was only 1,200 tons. But even here a 12-inch wire-rope, coiling an a drum of no less than 9 feet diameter, had to be adopted. The arrangement of working with blocks had often been applied, generally with chain, and of course only for small weights.

He thought Mr. Summers was wrong in his calculations as to the gearing for 3,000-ton vessels ; for instead of a pull of 203 tons being enough, he knew from experience that nearer 400 tons would be required, and therefore the factor of safety would only be about 1¾.