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Erecting shop of the Busch Sulzer Bros.-Diesel Engine Co., St. Louis, showing progress made (Oct. 8) in the building of two 1500 S. H. P. diesels for the twin screw conversion of the Standard Oil Co. two cycle scavenging with and 90 r. p. m.,, (N. 8 j tanker EK. T. Brprorp.—These engines are 4 cylinders, integrate scavenging pump and air compressor.—Extreme simplicity of design, 380 x 42 inches the product of 27 years of designing and building over 600 Diesel engines Bracketless System of Shipbuilding S IS well known, one of the chief A features of an Isherwood ship is that for given dimensions a considerable saving in the weight of steel involved in the hull is effected. It was the claim that such an econ- omy in the use of steel could be made that led a well-known shipbuilder to comment that he could not see how a ship was going to be successfully built and sent to sea whilst at the same time a goodly proportion of the steel was to be left in the yard. Nevertheless, it has been done, and is still being done; but Sir Joseph Isherwood seems to be of the opinion that it is not yet being as economical- ly or efficiently done as it might be, at any rate in the case of oil tank- ers. By ‘a drastic alteration of the in- ternal arrangements of the hull, Sir Joseph has successfully demonstrated in the construction of many hundreds of tankers how a considerable quan- tity of steel can be saved, as com- pared with the transverse method, and at the same time a great increase in the strength of the vessels be brought about. Pursuing his investi- gations a step further, he» now pro- poses by another ingenious modifica- Reprinted from Fairplay, April 30, 1925. tion to show how this can still be done and the construction simplified. Sir Joseph’s present proposal, which at first blush seems audacious, is to eliminate the corner brackets in the tanks. It is an accepted fact that the most fruitful source of trouble in the trans- versely framed oil tanker—and, in- cidentally, the chief item in the re- pairs and maintenance account—has been the utter impossibility of main- taining sound bracket connections to the bulkheads which would do what was intended of them and avoid leak- age. Eliminates Brackets at Bulkheads Sir Joseph Isherwood, in the de- velopment of the tanker on his sys- tem, greatly minimized, if, indeed, he did not almost eliminate this difficulty, and practically suppressed the leak- age; but it cannot, be gainsaid that he only achieved this at the cost of great expense, which was, however, considerably more than counterbal- anced by the other large economies effected. Sir Joseph’s present pro- posal goes a step better by obviating any possibility of leakage at the bulk- head bracket connections by leaving out the brackets, and, as this can be 439 done without in any way disturbing the continuity of longitudinal strength in the structure, it certainly should be most efficacious. Anyone familiar with the interior of the tanks, and looking at the number of brackets—which are so tedious and expensive to fit—connect- ing the longitudinal stiffeners at the sides of the ship to the horizontal stiffeners on the transverse bulkheads, and these transverse bulkhead stiff- eners to those on the _ longitudinal bulkhead, will readily grasp the ap- preciable simplification in construc- tion which is being effected, the re- sultant decrease in labour costs, and what it means to the ship in upkeep and maintenance. The corner brackets are eliminated from each tank by stopping the longi- tudinals at the sides of the ship and at the middle line bulkhead short of the transverse bulkheads and support- ing them by the transverses at the sides and the webs on the longitudinal bulkhead, dealing in the same way with the horizontal stiffeners on the transverse bulkheads. This is done by an ingenious disposition of ma- terials and scantlings. The spacing of transverses and sizes of longi- tudinals are so arranged that the