Coal fired ships

[Cavalry Corp]

Dear members,

I seem to remember that one class of late Japanese destroyer is coal powered? Is that true? I thought it was the Matsu but I may be wrong. It would be interesting to mod these by drastically reducing their fuel. Japan had large reserves of coal and I suppose that's not in any way measurable in the game. But one thing that would be useful is a ship that uses almost no fuel.

[Shellshock]

The Matsu class were pretty bare-bone ships, but I think they burned oil. ( in two widely separated engine compartments to improve on survivability to battle damage).


However, the minelayer/escort ship Shirataka built in 1929 was coal-burning from the time of her launch. Beginning in January 1945, as a result of the national oil shortage in Japan, the engine design of the Kaikoban class II Type D class escort vessels were modified to be able to burn coal. How widely this program was carried out I don't know.

Here's a picture of a Type D Kaikoban which sure appears to be burning coal, but the date on the picture suggests it was taken earlier than 1945.

[mind_messing]

PG Soerabaja was coal burning, as far as I know.

[PaxMondo]

several of the SC's were coal burning. I've got notes somewhere on which were which. And then one series was both, could switch as needed, but ran mostly coal due to bunker C shortages ...

[Shellshock]

If Wikipedia is any source to go by it looks like the W-1 class of Japanese minesweepers ran on coal fired engines too.

[Cavalry Corp]

Thanks - much appreciated. I looked up a few times but found nothing.

Now here is the question - we assume Japan has plenty of coal - if I reduced the fuel to 1 or something on these ships do they keep their existing range?

it would be a fair simulation I think if it works.

[RangerJoe]

How do you adjust the resources for the coal consumption?

[Cavalry Corp]

Well that would just be a small detail as resources are not that unavailable, I wanted to simulate the fact that coal-fired ships would have been of some benefit to Japan.I could reduce the available resources in production slightly (on the home island). Quite a simple thing to do. Would you be happy with that?

So far we have W1 class and Shirataka ML class and one allied ship

[Alfred]

ORIGINAL: cavalry

Well that would just be a small detail as resources are not that unavailable, I wanted to simulate the fact that coal-fired ships would have been of some benefit to Japan.I could reduce the available resources in production slightly (on the home island). Quite a simple thing to do. Would you be happy with that?

So far we have W1 class and Shirataka ML class and one allied ship

No it isn't just a small detail. You haven't thought through this logically at all. Do you really think that JWE/Symon, a qualified naval architect wasn't aware of coal propulsion and somehow didn't incorporate it into the existing abstractions. Just like whether a ship was single/twin/triple screwed isn't somehow incorporated into the abstraction.

Your proposal in post #6 of reducing fuel to 1 clearly demonstrates you haven't thought this through. All that fuel status would achieve is to permanently limit your ship to moving at a maximum of 1 hex per day and suffering the out of fuel penalties. Wouldn't be long before it sank on its maiden voyage. Is that what you really want to achieve.

The game already accounts for Japanese Home Island coal production by the quantum of Resource centres located there. Or did you think the Home Islands were pre 7 December 1941 awash with iron ore, bauxite, rubber, etc. Game resources are used to generate supplies. It is all an abstraction as clearly evidenced by the fact that aircraft consume supplies, not fuel in order to fly.

For the purposes of movement, no ship consumes supply. Hence you cannot directly adjust for consumption of coal burning ships. Their characteristics have to be abstracted. Why don't you look at what JWE/Symon did with those ships and see how you can improve on what he did.

Alfred

Edit: Actually, you get other problems if you reduce the fuel to 1 but keep the endurance at the previous level of say 3000. One is that you risk a crash to desktop. If that is avoided, you have created a nuclear powered ship with minimal refuel requirements.

[Cavalry Corp]

Alfred,

I was not criticising anyone's work and also I'm looking for help. I am still learning the editor and just thinking of ways to incorporate things. I was looking to the forum for guidance and advice on a hypothetical mod.

These are the reasons why I put post up and not just do things. I have looked at these classes of ship and their fuel level of use is actually very low anyway. My question about putting one point of fuel there was what would this do? I suspected that it would have a negative outcome. I cannot see what actually happens because the ships are not in play in question. I was not suggesting that they have a fuel level of one. I realise now what you are saying is that no matter what, the fuel level must be correct as abstracted and it will use fuel to move. It cannot use an abstraction of resources.

So this lack of fuel issue would also affect ships with just sails, so perhaps we will forget to add some coastal patrol ships with sails.

My point about the home islands was that Japan had apparently access to a lot of coal and it seems some ships were coal-fired. That must have been a strategic decision and advantage to do that.

Anyway thanks for your help.

[Q-Ball]

Question: Did Japan have plenty of coal? They certainly had more coal than oil, but was it plentiful? Or just not egregiously short?

Oil is cleaner, more efficient, and generates way more heat by weight. But I wonder why Japan didn't have more coal-fired merchants in the fleet

[PaxMondo]

lotta issues with coal compared to oil.
1. As noted, far greater space has to be allocated to the coal inventory compared to oil for the same range. Or for same inventory space, far shorter range.
2. Firebox cleans far more often.
3. Soot blows far more often
4. Larger firebox.
etc

Then logistically, you have to have a coal stock at ports along with all of the support for loading. This was done in the inland sea area.


Bottom line, could (and was) done for local tramp steamers, 500t and smaller, 1000 mi and shorter. They also did it for some of the SC's and AMc's. Coal was quite available, most homes were coal heated in Japan at this time. Mines were well developed as was the distribution system for it.

[spence]

As noted, far greater space has to be allocated to the coal inventory compared to oil for the same range. Or for same inventory space, far shorter range.

Space is one of those things that ships do not have aplenty.

Also there were many coal burning merchies in the Atlantic and it seems to me that they were mostly confined to the slow (SC/ONS) convoys. Also they seem to have created a relatively greater amount of smoke (in general) than their oil burning contemporaries which often led to the Uboats detecting the convoy even though the convoy was well over the horizon.

[PaxMondo]

Yeah, soot blows on coal furnaces are quite a bit bigger/longer than on oil fired. I know they always tried to do them at night ...

[Shellshock]

ORIGINAL: Q-Ball

Question: Did Japan have plenty of coal? They certainly had more coal than oil, but was it plentiful? Or just not egregiously short?

Oil is cleaner, more efficient, and generates way more heat by weight. But I wonder why Japan didn't have more coal-fired merchants in the fleet

Here's a link to a nice succinct article on the subject of coal (for both sides) at the Pacific War Online Encyclopedia.

http://pwencycl.kgbudge.com/C/o/Coal.htm

Coal was one of the few natural resources that the Japanese home islands produced in anything like the required quantities, with production averaging 43.2 million tons per year during the war. There are fairly extensive coal deposits in Hokkaido and Kyushu, the latter supplying many steel mills. However, the ferrying capacity across the Tsugaru Straits between Hokkaido and Honshu was inadequate to wartime demand, and most of Japan’s coal was rather low-quality bituminous coal.

[RangerJoe]

There is also the siting of coal fired ships by subs. A nice, black cloud during the day. I don't know about sparks at night.

[Cavalry Corp]

Also there is a lot of open faced coal mined in China. One reason they still use it today - its very easy to get. I imagine Japan had access to a lot of this as well.

[spence]

A nice, black cloud during the day.

Due to the relatively low height of a submarines bridge the sighting of smoke from one or more ships in a convoy may very well have contributed to a convoy's location. In 1925 a very large proportion of the world's merchant ships burned coal. Almost all warships had switched to burning fuel oil to increase their range of action.

[RangerJoe]

ORIGINAL: spence

A nice, black cloud during the day.

Due to the relatively low height of a submarines bridge the sighting of smoke from one or more ships in a convoy may very well have contributed to a convoy's location. In 1925 a very large proportion of the world's merchant ships burned coal. Almost all warships had switched to burning fuel oil to increase their range of action.

From my reading of books, the sub lookouts would report smoke on the horizon. Sometimes they would also raise the periscope to look farther out. Steer towards the smoke, see which way that it appears to move, then get ahead of the convoy and attack - if possible.