World's strangest paddlers - "Bessemer" 1875

[PJ]

Continuing the thread from Knapp's rollerboat, "Bessemer" surely deserves to be recognized as one of the world's strangest paddlers.  In fact a classic 4 x 4 of the sea. Four engines, four feathering paddle wheels, four funnels and a classic double-ender for "push-pull" operation in narrow estuaries.

mjt60a exclaims "Good grief! how did they intend to steer it???" Well the answer is "apparently with some difficulty" as she struck the pier at Calais on two occasions during her test voyages.

He also goes on to ask if a model has been made of her.  My recollection is there is a model at the Science Museum in London. UK and where I believe a full set of plans is held.  The ship would make a challenging and fascinating subject for a R/C model although her LOA of 350' would end up at over 7 feet long at 1/4" scale (1:48)!   Anybody brave enough to try it?

Here's a photo to give you some idea of her appearance.

PJ
Victoria, BC. Canada

[Waverley]

Nice to see a picture of Bessemer - may I add a bit?

She was one of three paddlers built in the 1870's in an unsuccessful attempt to produce a vessel which would be comfortable in the frequent bad weather conditions on the Calais -  Dover route across the English Channel, which can be very rough. I quote from Duckworth & Langmuir's standard histort "Railway & Other steamers" -

"The real peculiarity of the vessel lay in the design of the saloon - Bessemer's (of steel manufacturing fame) invention - whereby it could be moved relative to the hull. Initially the movement was to be done manually with the aid of hydraulic cylinders, and, if successful gyroscopic control was to be substituted., the whole idea being to keep the saloon (and its passengers) "on an even keel" regardless of the movements lof the hull.  It appears that the ship .... steered extremely badly and was more or less unmanageable when entering port."

The mind boggles!

Incidentally the other attempts were both twin hulled vessels with two(Castalia, 1874) or a single (Calais-Douvres, 1877) central paddle wheels. At 11 and 13 knots respectively, they were far too slow for the passage and did not last long - and Castalia's sea going qualites are described as bad which would imply she was even less comfortable than the conventional paddlers in bad weather.

Regards

David

(Written before I saw mjt60a's post on another thread - article well worth reading & bookmarked)

[Eddy Matthews]

Has anyone got any photos of these "Oddball" paddlers?  When it comes to modelling, I like to chose the more unusual subjects, so maybe one of them will appeal to me and be put on the list for a future project...

[PJ]

Hey David..thank you for mentioning the other two "strange" paddlers of the "Bessemer" era, "Castalia" and "Calais-Douvre."

By the way, some of you might have noted the extremely low prow/stern of "Bessemer".  This was to allow her to plunge through waves rather than lift over them,  essentially to reduce pitching in a heavy sea.
Imagine the heart stopping impact of a "green one" on her superstructure!
 
For Eddy and everyone else who would like to see the catamaran hulled "Castalia", (my favourite of the trio) here she is. By the way, she was regarded as a total failure for as author Richard Clammer states, "not only was she a very poor seaboat, but she was also only capable of 11 knots"

And as for handling...one can only imagine the nightmare!

PJ
Victoria, BC Canada

[thewharfonline]

Hmmm I think Eddy you may need to add an unusual paddlers link becoz me and Iner have been having a great conversation bout unuasal paddlers and these people have too!